Ubuntu 19.10 To Bundle NVIDIA's Proprietary Driver Packages As Part Of Its ISO

For Ubuntu 19.10 the developers are adding the NVIDIA driver packages onto the ISO. The NVIDIA binary drivers won't be activated by default, but will be present on the install media to make it easier to enable post-install.

The open-source NVIDIA "Nouveau" drivers will remain the default for NVIDIA graphics on new Ubuntu installations, but this change is positioning the mainline and legacy NVIDIA proprietary drivers onto the Ubuntu ISO so that they can be easily obtained locally post-install. The main driver here is allowing users to enable the NVIDIA proprietary graphics on Ubuntu even if you don't have an Internet connection. NVIDIA has already okay'ed the distribution of their driver packages with the Ubuntu ISO.

On the downside, adding the NVIDIA 390 and 418 drivers to the ISO pool has inflated the size of Ubuntu Eoan by 114MB. The overall Ubuntu x86_64 ISO size is now up to around 2.1GB.

This NVIDIA plan for Ubuntu 19.10 "Eoan" was firmed up this week via this Launchpad thread.