[HELP] Installing Kali Linux on a Nvidia Optimus system

[chaopac]

Hi everyone, first of all i just want to say i'm glad to join such a helpful community as this. And to clear it up, I do know computer (just a university student), but not that well, especially Linux since I have never used Linux before. I wanted to install Kali Linux on my machine just for a learning experience in computer security (it all seems very intriguing). However I have been stucked with these errors for the last couple of days trying to install the OS.

Here are my machine specs:

Dell Inspiron 7559
i7-6700HQ
8GB RAM
Nvidia 960M GPU
Windows 10 Pro 1607
BIOS mode: UEFI Version: 3.0

Method of OS installation: through bootable USB, Dual-boot system

I have successfully installed Kali on my HDD, however, when I boot it up, right after I enterd my credentials at the login screen, the machine freezes. And as my searches show, it is due to the fact that my machine have a dedicated discrete graphics card, being the Nvidia 960M, as well as an on board one, which is the Intel HD Graphics 530. This is the Optimus configuration by Nvidia as far as I read. And it is a frequent issues with many threads have already been created about this issue. However, after almost a week of searching, I have tried many various solutions around the web (obviously not every single one of them since some are very long, confusing and I do not know how to execute them) but they all give me the same errors, such as these:

"watchdog did not stop"
"detected stalls on CPU"
"NMI watchdong bug soft lock-up"

these are the ones I could written down, as the errors screen runs in a loop.

The solutions I have tried are:

- https://forums.kali.org/showthread.p...an-t-start-gui tried: installing Nvidia drivers, but get errors at dist-upgrade, even if skip dist-upgrade entirely still get errors at install nvidia drivers itself.
- https://forums.kali.org/showthread.p...ptimus-laptop: Even the lspci give me the errors.
- https://forums.kali.org/showthread.p...s-after-login: I couldn't find the file /etc/X11/xorg.config with the command ls as root.
- https://forums.kali.org/showthread.p...bility-Issues: ACPI seems to be a dead end.

and several more solutions that I have already tried and closed their tabs that I don't remember off the top of my head right now.


I always format the Kali partition and reinstall Kali every time I try a new solutions.


It is very frustrating to can't even complete the OS install. but i don't intend to give up soon, so if anyone have any suggestions or have been able to fixed the problem themselves, please let me know I would love to hear and finally fix this issue. I would appreciate it a lot. But please explain it to me in very basic steps because i am a total noob in terminal.

Thank you very much for everyone who read the thread and the moderators. and sorry for bad english.

[SOLUTION:]

This is caused by Kali failing to start the Nvidia graphic card. To forces Kali to use Intel integrated graphic card. I recommend using the following commands in tty (i.e: When you are at the log in screen, press the combination Ctrl + Alt + F1-F12, try to find your combination) to remove all Nvidia related components.

apt-get remove --purge nvidia*
rm -rf /etc/X11/xorg.conf
rm -rf /usr/share/gdm/greeter/autostart/optimus.desktop
rm -rf /etc/xdg/autostart/optimus.desktop

After running these commands and reboot, you will be able to log into Kali without the OS freezing. Now follow the guide here at the link:

https://forums.kali.org/showthread.p...Optimus-laptop

To install Nvidia drivers again. You should succeed in running Kali with the dedicated graphic card now after you have followed the guide.

Good luck.