Ubuntu – Difference between installing CUDA using nvidia-cuda-toolkit and the .run file

13.10cudanvidia

My laptop has a Ubuntu 13.10 installed and has a Nvidia 630M graphics card. I have been trying to install CUDA. I installed it using:

sudo apt-get install nvidia-cuda-dev nvidia-cuda-doc nvidia-cuda-gdb nvidia-cuda-toolkit

What I want to know is what is the difference between installing it using the above command and the procedure given at the NVIDIA page here

Best Answer

Mostly the version - Ubuntu's repository is a bit behind, as it prefers stability over cutting edge.

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Ubuntu – CUDA sample code did not get installed through sudo apt-get install nvidia-cuda-toolkit; any solutions

I have exactely the same issue. I am trying to test my working setup with Ubuntu 16.04 and GTX1080 with CUDA 7.5 for parallel computing, and was hoping to easily get this done by using the packages provided in the repos. Unfortunately as noted above they are missing. It is possible to use the runfile install for installing only the samples. See e.g. for an older version:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/27306724/ubuntu-14-04-how-to-install-cuda-6-5-without-installing-nvidia-driver

This works also for 7.5. Simply say "no" when prompted for driver and toolkit installation. You will also need to set the right toolkit libraries. This installs cuda samples into your home by default. However there seem to be an issue with libraries not being found as the package from the repo also puts them into a different location.

However some simple samples like matrixMul compile and run fine.

There might be a simple workaround by adding the right path, but probably installing at least cuda-toolkit together with samples from the runfile should make it work 'out-of-the-box' - have not tried it yet...

Ubuntu – difference between “sudo apt-get install cuda” and “sudo apt-get install nvidia-cuda-toolkit”

The "difference" is that there does not exist any package with the name cuda, so you can not install it - the package nvidia-cuda-toolkit though does exist (see the explanation below) :

apt policy cuda
N: Unable to locate package cuda  

apt policy nvidia-cuda-toolkit  
nvidia-cuda-toolkit:
  Installed: (none)
  Candidate: 8.0.44-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
     8.0.44-0ubuntu1 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu yakkety/multiverse amd64 Packages

The Compute Unified Device Architecture (CUDA) enables NVIDIA graphics processing units (GPUs) to be used for massively parallel general purpose computation. nvidia-cuda-toolkit contains the nvcc compiler and other tools needed for building CUDA applications. Learn more about the details on the official NVIDIA Accelerated Computing Portal -> NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit

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Ubuntu – CUDA sample code did not get installed through sudo apt-get install nvidia-cuda-toolkit; any solutions

Ubuntu – difference between “sudo apt-get install cuda” and “sudo apt-get install nvidia-cuda-toolkit”

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