NVIDIA driver install not working

Hello All,

I'm using using OMV 8.11 Synchrony with proxmox 6.14.11-5-pve kernel. I'm trying to install the nvidia drivers but it fails:

relevant part from the logs:

Setting up nvidia-kernel-dkms (550.163.01-2) ...

Loading new nvidia-current/550.163.01 DKMS files...

WARNING: No kernel headers were found, skipping module build.

To get the headers for the running kernel (6.14.11-5-pve)

please install the linux-headers-6.14.11-5-pve package.

The header is installed already:

root@nas:~# apt-get install linux-headers-6.14.11-5-pve

Reading package lists... Done

Building dependency tree... Done

Reading state information... Done

Note, selecting 'linux-headers-6.14.11-5-pve-amd64' for regex 'linux-headers-6.14.11-5-pve'

Note, selecting 'proxmox-headers-6.14.11-5-pve' instead of 'linux-headers-6.14.11-5-pve-amd64'

proxmox-headers-6.14.11-5-pve is already the newest version (6.14.11-5).

0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 24 not upgraded.

So the issue in my interpretation is its looking for the wrong header name for some reason. I cant figure out why or how to fix it. Any tips?

Quote from ryecoaaron

Building nvidia drivers on the proxmox kernel is kind of a pain. I recommend using the Debian kernel - I do on my nvidia system.

The problem is I already have a 40 TB ZFS pool I would like to stick with. I didnt find a good way to get ZFS working on the debian kernel, but maybe that would be an easier fix...

I don't use an nvidia card, but I set one up for a friend. Here is the process that worked for me.

Quote from BernH

Post

RE: Getting Nvidia Card to be used OMV7

[…]

I don't have a lot of experience setting up nvidia cards and don't profess to be an expert with them, although I did set one up for a friend. I personally use an Arc card in my system and as you say they just sort of work as long as your kernel is 6.2 or higher.

nvidia cards require that the drivers get compiled against the kernel and there are some updates in the backports repo that broke the drivers for my friend. I had to disable backports and re-install.

That said, you used a guide for omv…

BernH

Aug 19th 2025

This wouldnt work for me due the proxmox kernel. I tried installing the driver with the debian kernel and thats working fine so its a good guide for that situation.

Anyway I think I figured it out.

Looks like if you dont use the Debian kernel you shouldnt use either the Debian wiki nor the nvidia wiki it wont install due the nvidia installer being so dumb it cant find the correct header. This seems to be a common problem based on the proxmox forum, many people ran into this problem. So you cant install the drivers via APT, you have to download the ran file from nvidia and install with a small script.

You need this one I found on the Proxmox forum, but with an additonal parameter defining the kernel source path:

./$(ls -t NVIDIA*.run | head -n 1) --dkms --disable-nouveau --no-install-libglvnd --kernel-source-path /usr/src/linux-headers-6.14.11-5-pve

This first failed because I was missing a package but based on the install logs I could fix it with:

sudo apt install libdw1t64

This helped to install the driver, but got 2 warning:

Warning 1: not sure if its really an issue, things seem to work.

Warning 2:

I added:

ln -sf /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libGL.so.1 /usr/lib/libGL.so.1

Now nvidia-smi starts and shows the correct GPU and driver version. I also generated the CDI definition for docker based on the nvidia guide and tested by running an AI modell in ollama:

Quote from ryecoaaron

proxmox kernel will work. just have to deal with the header issues. If you are compiling modules anyway, there isn't much incentive to use the proxmox kernel.

Well I'm learning linux as I go.... I remember spending like a week trying to get ZFS work with the debian kernel a year ago and couldnt get it work.

Maybe I will give it another shot I understand linux slightly better now.