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26

I've just installed Ubuntu and I need either video, wireless, or some sort of other manufacturer (non-opensource) driver. How can I run the tool that will fetch all of these for me? I'd like graphical instructions.

Related:

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up vote 52 down vote
+100

Unity (12.04)

Ensure that you are connected to the internet, if you are installing wireless drivers then usually you need to be plugged in via an ethernet cable. Click on the Ubuntu logo in the launcher and type drivers and click on the icon that appears.

Screenshot of searching the Dash for "drivers". First result selected.

If you have hardware for which there are supporting drivers to download, they'll show up in this window and allow you to install them. If nothing shows up in this window then you probably don't need drivers installed for your hardware as they come bundled with Ubuntu.

Image of Additional drivers window

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There was a very good programmer team, creator of the sites touslesdrivers.com (now dead), maconfig.com(now dead),that became now driverscloud.com. I don't know if anyone knows them. It was a drivers scanning software suggesting drivers to update, but online, for Linux & Windows. I didn't find something as good as it was before they change their name. I was a good complement to the Linux driver tool. – Quidam Dec 25 '16 at 12:02
    
@Quidam when installing ubuntu do i need drivers to support other thins like wifi etc. just like in windows? – guradio Aug 29 '17 at 2:32
    
Yes, you need drivers, with any OS, because drivers are the pieces of software that makes the hardware and the software work together. Which drivers you need depends from your hardware (What's your computer model, your wifi card, etc). With Linux, you have the choice sometimes to get the open-source drivers, or the proprietary drivers. – Quidam Aug 29 '17 at 18:52
up vote 48 down vote accepted

Unity (15.10 and 15.04/14.04/13.04/14.10/13.10/12.10)

Click on the gear icon on the top right corner of your screen and click on "System Settings" from that menu, click on Software Sources (or you can click on the Ubuntu button and search for "Sources":

enter image description here

and then on the Additional drivers tab:

enter image description here

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1  
Is there a way to do this selection in the terminal? I changed drivers and now I can only access the terminal. – Basil Sep 12 '13 at 13:59
    
@Basil see the top question, there's a link to a CLI version. – Jorge Castro Sep 12 '13 at 15:03
1  
If you can't see the"Software Sources" (a.k.a. "Software & Updates") icon, install the software-properties-gtk package. – Waldir Leoncio Aug 23 '15 at 13:06
    
I have a graphic card STRIX-R7370-DC2OC-2GD5-GAMING but the Additional Drivers dialog does not show me any related device / driver. How can I install the driver for my graphic card? – Kin Oct 16 '16 at 9:51
up vote 23 down vote

to complete the already excellent accepted answer

Important: Firstly, ensure that you are connected to the internet either wirelessly or via fixed ethernet.

Lubuntu

enter image description here

Kubuntu

enter image description here

Xubuntu

enter image description here

and what happens next...

and after selecting Additional Drivers (or Hardware Drivers in 10.04)

The following briefly appears

enter image description here

Followed by:

enter image description here

Choose from the list of offered drivers - click the Activate button.

Then reboot.

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up vote 10 down vote

Drivers

Unlike Windows, most hardware is natively supported in Ubuntu and does not require separate drivers to work. Generally speaking, if it works don't worry about a driver not being installed. Please note: there is a bug so that your graphics card will be displayed as Unknown in System Settings even if the driver is correctly installed and working--you can safely ignore this (or see this Q&A for the workaround).

If however something isn't working:

Ubuntu uses a graphical user interface called jockey or "Additional Drivers" to manage and install hardware drivers that are not natively supported by Ubuntu.

To open it hit Alt+F2 and type jockey-gtk.

A window will then open that will allow you to select additional drivers for sound, video, wireless etc. Here's a screenshot of this window, I already have several drivers enabled.

jockey

If something still doesn't work and you don't see a relevant driver in Jockey, please post a specific question including as much information about your hardware and what you have tried!

Applications

New applications on the other hand--as opposed to drivers--will have to be installed manually. However, unlike Windows, Ubuntu manages software centrally using repositories--in short, you don't have to go find/download software yourself. Ubuntu Software Center is one option for installing software (see this question) but you can also install from the command line usingsudo apt-get install software-name (see this question for more information on finding/installing software from the command line). You can also download Debian packages (.deb) from the internet and manually install them (or compile software yourself from source code if you are feeling ambitious)--but it's much safer and more convenient to install from the repositories. Welcome to Ubuntu!

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2  
Jockey has been merged into the software center, could you perhaps update your answer to reflect that? – Seth♦ Feb 28 '14 at 19:47
    
this is an old post but still useful; jockey is no longer used as of... 13.04? In any case if you're on 14.10 and probably 14.04 jockey is no longer used. – dez93_2000 Nov 3 '14 at 18:30

protected by Seth♦ Feb 28 '14 at 19:37

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