I’ve been using Blender on windows previously, and I just changed to Ubuntu 12.04
I cannot choose cycles from the usual drop down at the top. Loading projects that were previously using cycles doesn’t work either.
Am I missing something?
Is the cycles addon enabled in user preferences ?
Did you download from blender.org
Have you tried 2.63a
I don’t see it as an addon.
I got it from the ubuntu software center.
I have not tried 2.63a, Cycles should be included in 2.62 as far as I know.
It is an addon, you have to enable cycles for your nvidia GFX card (AMD/ATI cards don´t work). CPU rendering should work out of the box.
You need a suitable nvidia driver an you need cuda toolkit http://developer.nvidia.com/cuda-downloads.
Take 2.63a, unzip where you want, ready. Or take a development build from http://builder.blender.org/download/.
Cheers, mib.
Thank you mib.
Could you or someone explain this process a little more clearly?
I’m new to linux, and I don’t understand everything you said about drivers, and graphics cards.
For example, for the CUDA, should I get the “Download Drivers(Ver 295.41)?”
And I have no idea what a “suitable nvidia driver” would be.
First, what kind of computer do you have? Laptop? Does it have optimus technology?
You also need to find out what kind of video card your computer has… open a terminal and type lspci. you will get something like this:
I’m stuck with optimus and here, you see 2 different “VGA compatible controller:” lines and the 2nd one is my nvidia 525m (yeah ubuntu is wrong but they use the same driver so it’s close enough to work…).
If you do have optimus, you have to install Bumblebee - your nvidia card is just dead weight in linux without it.
follow the installation instructions (they are step by step & pretty easy) and your card will now work. Unfortunately, to use it for blender you now either have to run it in a terminal with optirun ./blender or change the launcher to include optirun. Welcome to the dark side of linux 
Here’s my result:
http://imgur.com/9rMVO
I see “ATI RS880M.”
I’m using an HP Pavillion dv7.
From what mib said, it seems like all this work is to get GPU rendering.
I’d be fine with CPU rendering but I don’t have Cycles at all.
ok, pretty much ignore my last post… it was just for nvidia cards and you obviously have an ati
it’s foolish to stay with 2.62 anyway get 2.63a and try it. if that doesn’t work, search the forums for cycles + ati to find some answers.
Hi Kaninepete, forget about GPU rendering.
It is possible to build/compile blender without cycles, maybe there is no cycles in the ubuntu software version.
You should try the official version from blender.org, you have nothing to install, only unzip.
The cycles addon is enabled by default. For CPU rendering you don´t need special drivers or other software. Switch to cycles in render menu.
Good luck, mib.
yeah, like mib2berlin said, i don’t know about the build you’re downloading from the software center, it may or may not even include Cycles. but compiling Blender in ubuntu is really really easy. you should give it a shot: http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:2.5/Doc/Building_Blender/Linux/Ubuntu/Scons
or
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:2.5/Doc/Building_Blender/Linux/Ubuntu/CMake
if you get stuck or need any help, you’re welcome to PM me.
i don’t generally trust what’s available in the software center, there are almost always newer versions of the software that you can download elsewhere or get the most recent source and compile yourself.
Thanks again to everyone contributing!
I’m trying ohsnapitsjoel’s, scons method,
But I get this error:
parker@parker-HP-Pavilion-dv7-Notebook-PC:~/blender-svn$ svn co https://svn.blender.org/svnroot/bf-blender/trunk/blender
svn: OPTIONS of ‘https://svn.blender.org/svnroot/bf-blender/trunk/blender’: could not connect to server (https://svn.blender.org)
I’ll try again after work.
You guys are the best!
Kaninepete,
you don’t have to compile yourself if you want the latest Blender release, in case you misunderstood. If you want to learn to compile on Linux, fine, it’s easy, but might be a bit much for a new Linux user.
If you just want to have the latest Blender, download from blender.org, extract somewhere where you have permissions (your home directory is fine) and just run Blender from there. Doubleclick on the executable file “blender” or, if you want to start from a terminal window, cd to the directory where you extracted to and type “./blender”, without the quotes. “dot slash” at the start means: look in the directory I’m in for an executable named blender. If you just type “blender” you will start your blender from the software center.
If it works, it might be best to uninstall the other one.
Edit: oh, and if you still do want to compile, about that svn error, it’s not you, the server seems to be down. I can’t connect either.
But a new Linux user should. Software provided by the distribution is made to work fine with that distribution, and is considered stable. Until a new Linux user knows a bit more about the system, it’s a good idea to only install software from the package manager/software center. To not do that can and will lead to chaos if not done with a bit of care and knowledge, and should be done only as exception for software you simply have to have the latest version of (like Blender of course ;)) and are willing and able to maintain yourself.
A new Linux user has to be made aware of that, or frustrations are likely to occur down the road.
I totally agree with Sanne, and am sorry I didn’t catch on to the fact that you were stuck with 2.62 because of the software center. Forget wasting your time building for now, wait until you are a bit more comfortable with the terminal & with linux in general.
Here are some fast and easy options that can get you up to speed literally in minutes (with links):
If you want official 3.63a go here: http://www.blender.org/download/get-blender/ latest stable release and built to be as compatible with any system as possible. These are the builds that eventually end up in the software center ( ubuntu is usually ~6 mo. behind and thats a long time for blender ). The disadvantage is that it may have bugs that have been fixed since it was released.
blender.org also offers daily buildbot builds here: http://builder.blender.org/download/ and they are built to the same specs as the official release. nice because it contains latest bug fixes and features, but may have new bugs… (servers are down atm though, like svn)
Both of these are the vanilla ice cream of blender so to speak - good but a bit plain and ordinary.
And then you have: http://www.graphicall.org/ The ice cream parlor of blender ;), lots of options here:
new flavors (branch builds )…tomato ice cream? You betcha!;
special syrups (patches)…gimme a ladle of planet texture & demolition;
toppings (new addons)… and sprinkle some Luxrender on top;
and, of course caffeine ( optimizations)…and a cup of OpenMP with -02;
not only are there new builds popping up all day, but each build has it’s own comment thread for discussions about that particular build (bugs or other problems you might have) Some of the builds even show the usr-config.py that they have used ( useful for if/when you do start build your own…and you might… after all, who doesn’t like home made ice cream better?)
Thank you Sanne,
but I’m still having trouble.
I downloaded 2.63a via gpaprmh’s link.
I believe I extracted it properly, to Home/Documents.
I see this:
http://imgur.com/Zw1XE
Double clicking “blender” does nothing.
Should I “open with” something?
I tried the command line method that you outlined, and “./blender” without qoutes returns "no such file or directory.
I cd’d down to blender-2.63a-linux-glibc27-i686
Is that right?
Should I uninstall the cycles-less one first?
I needed 64 bit!
Thanks everyone!
Okay, Cycles works, and you guys are absolutely the best.
Could you help me one more time, before I mark this as solved?
How do I get this Cycles-equipped version of blender to show up in my Unity bar?
The old one is still sitting there, inactive, and the good one doesn’t have an icon at all.
It doesn’t show up in ctrl-tab either.
Kaninepete,
ha, glad you got it sorted. 
First some more Linux info, since you ran into that problem: I don’t know why you got that message when you tried to start blender from the terminal. Usually it means that you are either not in the correct directory, or that you mistyped. You should try it again, because it’s very useful to start programs that way when there are problems. Then you can see the error messages from the program, which are usually printed to the terminal.
So, if you try again to start blender from the terminal, you can type “./bl” and then tab or tab twice. Using tab is a nice feature of the Linux command shell that will autocomplete any command starting with your typed letters, or show you the alternatives in case there’s more than one. So you can be sure that you don’t mistype, and you also don’t have to type long words. Works also for cd and directories, very handy.
For your Unity question I can’t help, I don’t use it. Is the Unity bar what you use to start programs? If so, usually every Linux desktop environment has a way to manually specify those starter icons. You’d need to read some docs or maybe ask at Ubuntu forums or irc channels, if nobody here knows how to do it.
That it doesn’t show up in those places in exactly one of those reasons why I recommend to always install from the official repositories of your distro if possible. Desktop integration work is done for you then. What I said above “willing to maintain yourself manually installed software”, this is one of the cases I meant. You have to do the integration yourself also. If you want to remove such programs, you have to do it yourself also, because your package manager isn’t aware of it.
Sorry, another wordy post. English is not my first language and I tend to need more words than others to get my point across, if I even manage to do that hehe. I hope I did.
Sanne, your English is perfect. I had no idea you were struggling
You guys done more than enough.
Thank you all very much.
ehhhhhhhhh, i suppose you have a point, with most other software. some are a reaaaal pain. my apologies for being misleading, for a new user.
this is my jolly off-topic mini-tirade: in the case of Blender, though, it’s incredibly easy even for a new Linux user (assuming of course, the server is up!! 
and that the user is capable of typing - no broken fingers or anything at the moment :p). the wiki pages specify all the dependencies as well as the commands for getting them. and if one can spare 20 minutes, it’s worth it to have the most up-to-date version of trunk, with all its bugfixes and new features. which… are sometimes…buggy…
oh and regarding the Unity launcher - http://www.geekyboy.com/archives/384
i think i remember it being a little easier than this in 11.04