When I first installed Zorin, I was able to get the NVIDIA drivers working properly. A few months later I started having minor issues with video, and checked on the NVIDIA site for an updated driver based on my graphics card - because that's how I had managed the process on other OSs.
I downloaded the latest driver, tried to install it from Terminal but ran into errors that ended the install without success. Hmmm. I searched on how to update more-manually, to get around the issue, and found a seven-step Terminal tutorial (for Ubuntu linux in general). Not user friendly, seemed fraught with opportunity to mess up it and my system up.
In the end after more looking, I kind of stumbled across the solution -- in Zorin, it's super easy to update your NVIDIA graphics drivers. Here are the steps:
Go to Software Updater
After it automatically checks for updates, select Settings...
Then select the Additional Drivers tab, far right
Software Updater searches for available drivers, then shows all the available NVIDIA drivers for your installation. The most recent releases will be on top. The filled-in radio button shows which driver you're currently using.
If your driver isn't the latest, do the following to update:
Select the newest stable driver, likely one that has (proprietary, tested) after the name and number
Select the Apply Changes button
At that point, Zorin automatically downloads the driver, and applies the new driver to your system.
This seems simple and obvious now, but I searched (in forums and elsewhere) and found nothing clear. So I'm posting this here, in hope that someone else benefits from a search that returns this posts and takes the easy path.
Thank you, Davidi. Is choosing the correct NVIDIA driver really this simple.
Sorry for the need for reassurance, but I am a complete Linux newbie. Your advice sounds perfectly logical but I fear I may be just one more mistake away from bricking my machine. I recently did a dual boot install on this iMac. Everything was running perfectly until I attempted to change screen resolution. I got a black screen of death on Zorin Desktop. Then MacOS and my boot loader do not load anymore. Only Zorin loads after reboot. Zorin Desktop is still blackscreens after entering password. But I can get to Zorin on Wayland and it is working fine so far. But I think I need to get my drivers right or it may black screen on me too.
The image below appears in Software Updater in the Additional Driver's tab. Am I interpreting what it says correctly in that any of those driver suggestions will work and that the top choice is recommended over the others?
Hi @zGnOmaha - I've always selected the highest version (in the case of this screen, v410) that's from NVIDIA, and select the metapackage. That's under the usually correct presumption that each version fixes as many collective bugs as possible from previous versions.
I hope that helps! Interested to hear how the iMac performs on Zorin, too.
Hi @davidi The iMac is working great. I am really liking this Zorin experience. Earlier I did try selection the highest version and I ended up having to reinstall Zorin as I got the black screen of death with the latest driver when I tried changing screen resolution. Thus on this install, I have left the default driver in place and haven't gone hear the resolution setting. Obviously, I can't say for certain this is the right approach or for sure if the previous driver selection was the cause. But so far so good with the default driver and staying away from the resolution setting.
Glad to hear the Mac hardware is working well. I've worked on Windows and Macs, and am a huge fan of Zorin. I recently bought 2 identical mini PCs (low-end, 8GB ram / 256GB HD and a Celeron) and had to install Windows on one, Zorin on the other. It's pretty stark how much faster Zorin (16, and beta no less) installs, launches, reacts, discovers all hardware, all that. And as you say, the experience itself is just... superior.
So with nice / powerful Mac hardware, I can only imagine how snappy it'll all be. Thanks for posting, good luck with the drivers.
Hi there, thanks for the information.
When I check the drivers in that section all the radio buttons are greyed out=disabled. Is there a way of accessing the software updater as the root user that you found to be able to select an option?
cheers CD
Hi there, thanks for your reply and suggestion.
I had already seen that one and assumed it was too old.
I have run through those steps and the options are now UN-Greyed. But the options showing are not the latest drivers available.
My system is using the same version 580 as it was before I ran the steps above. The current driver available is 850 released Set 10 2025.
I have downloaded the .run file from NVIDIA for the ver. 850 driver (NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-580.82.09) but I don't know how to install it, yet!!.
Here is a guide how to do this. I haven't done this yet. Replace your downloaded driver with the name of the older drivers mentioned there:
For most users, the drivers displayed at Software&Updates >Additional drivers are sufficient and much easier to handle. Do you need the latest version?
