As stated, there are 2 primary NVIDIA (Where did the 'e' come from?)
- nv - AKA, the Xorg "xf86-video-nv" driver, open source, accel 2D only.. Xvideo is supported.
- nvidia - The proprietary vendor-supplied binary-only blob driver, it supports accelerated 2D and 3D, buggy.. only works on a handful of "supported" OS's and architectures.
There is also a project aimed at reverse engineering nVidia chipsets, it's called "Nouveau", but it's in the early stages.. BSD support is kinda hit and miss.. 3D is still a W.I.P.
http://xorg.freedesktop.org/wiki/nv
http://www.nvidia.com/object/unix.html
http://nouveau.freedesktop.org/wiki/
I personally, along with many others, would never use the vendor supplied driver if had the chance of doing so.. avoid it if you can, save up and invest in a good ATI/AMD card. (
The vendor is releasing documentation!).