Adjust GPU Fan Speed NVIDIA on Ubuntu Server Headless

The problem when adjusting my dual RTX 4090 in Ubuntu Server 23.10 is, when running nvidia-settings its trigger error

ERROR: The control display is undefined; please run `nvidia-settings --help`
       for usage information.

I’ve been search on internet and not found a better solution, then I decided try to install X and attached, while running nvidia-setting. The result its works. Here are the step by step on how to enable GPU fan speed in Ubuntu Server 23.10

1. Install XServer

sudo apt install -y xorg xinit

2. Give permission to run X for user

Edit the file and change console into anybody to give permission to running X and add permission. This also needed for Ubuntu 23.10 Desktop as well

sudo vim /etc/X11/Xwrapper.config

# If you have edited this file but would like it to be automatically updated
# again, run the following command as root:
#   dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg-legacy

allowed_users=anybody
needs_root_rights=yes

Reboot!

If you don’t change this, it will trigger error.

/usr/lib/xorg/Xorg.wrap: Only console users are allowed to run the X server

3. Run X and export display (excute each line)

No root access required.

X :1 &
export DISPLAY=:1

4. Now you can execute adjusting fan speed using nvidia-settings without problem on Ubuntu without X.

No root access required.

Adjust for 50% speed. This is for dual GPU

#!/bin/bash
nvidia-settings -a "[gpu:0]/GPUFanControlState=1"
nvidia-settings -a "[fan:0]/GPUTargetFanSpeed=30"
nvidia-settings -a "[fan:1]/GPUTargetFanSpeed=30"

nvidia-settings -a "[gpu:1]/GPUFanControlState=1"
nvidia-settings -a "[fan:2]/GPUTargetFanSpeed=30"
nvidia-settings -a "[fan:3]/GPUTargetFanSpeed=30"

#!/bin/bash                                                                                                                                               
                                                                                                                                                          
# Check if an argument is provided                                                                                                                        
if [ -z "$1" ]; then                                                                                                                                      
    echo "Usage: $0 <fan_speed>"                                                                                                                          
    echo "Please provide a fan speed percentage (0-100)."                                                                                                 
    exit 1                                                                                                                                                
fi        

# Validate input (must be a number between 0 and 100)
if ! [[ "$1" =~ ^[0-9]+$ ]] || [ "$1" -lt 0 ] || [ "$1" -gt 100 ]; then
    echo "Error: Fan speed must be an integer between 0 and 100."
    exit 1
fi

FAN_SPEED=$1
FAN_SPEED_TWO=$2

# Set fan control state and speed for all fans on gpu:0
echo "Setting fan speed to $FAN_SPEED% for GPU 0..."
nvidia-settings -a "[gpu:0]/GPUFanControlState=1"
nvidia-settings -a "[fan:0]/GPUTargetFanSpeed=$FAN_SPEED"
nvidia-settings -a "[fan:1]/GPUTargetFanSpeed=$FAN_SPEED"

echo "Setting fan speed to $FAN_SPEED_TWO% for GPU 1..."
nvidia-settings -a "[gpu:1]/GPUFanControlState=1"
nvidia-settings -a "[fan:2]/GPUTargetFanSpeed=$FAN_SPEED_TWO"
nvidia-settings -a "[fan:3]/GPUTargetFanSpeed=$FAN_SPEED_TWO"

echo "Fan speed set to $FAN_SPEED% and $FAN_SPEED_TWO% for both GPUs."

Too HOT? reduce the power consumption by

sudo nvidia-smi -i 0 -pl 250
sudo nvidia-smi -i 1 -pl 250

Hope its help you and have a great day!

If you logout and need to re-connect, you just export the display. First check whether X is running

$ ps aux | grep X
root        2681  0.1  0.0 25362060 66584 tty2   Ssl+ 08:56   0:03 /usr/lib/xorg/Xorg :1
user         5163  0.0  0.0   7048  1920 pts/1    S+   09:56   0:00 grep --color=auto X

Then you can export it

export DISPLAY=:1