mjhjmtu

I am replacing the old GPU Quadro FX 580 running on Nouvea drivers on Debian 9.5.

I am going to install NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 TI GPU possibly with the latest Nvidia propriatery drivers (currently these are NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-410.66)

My current kernel version is

$cat /proc/version
Linux version 4.9.0-8-amd64 (debian-kernel@lists.debian.org) (gcc version 6.3.0 20170516 (Debian 6.3.0-18+deb9u1) ) #1 SMP Debian 4.9.110-3+deb9u6 (2018-10-08)

Loaded nouveau modules:

$ lsmod | grep nouveau
nouveau 1556480 4
mxm_wmi 16384 1 nouveau
wmi 16384 2 mxm_wmi,nouveau
video 40960 1 nouveau
ttm 98304 1 nouveau
drm_kms_helper 155648 1 nouveau
drm 360448 7 nouveau,ttm,drm_kms_helper
i2c_algo_bit 16384 1 nouveau
button 16384 1 nouveau

Some additional info :

$ inxi -Gx
Graphics: Card: NVIDIA G96GL [Quadro FX 580] bus-ID: 05:00.0
 Display Server: X.Org 1.19.2 drivers: nouveau (unloaded: modesetting,fbdev,vesa)
 Resolution: 1920x1200@59.95hz, 1920x1200@59.95hz
 GLX Renderer: Gallium 0.4 on NV96 GLX Version: 3.0 Mesa 13.0.6 Direct Rendering: Yes

My question is how to prepare the whole operation in order to go smoothly through whe upgrade process:

What steps should be taken before I take out the old GPU and inster the new one, e.g.

1. 
   

   What configuration files should I backup

   
   
   
   • Should I install some packages first
   
   
   • Should I uninstall some packages
   
   
   • Should I update configuration files
   
   
   • Should I update blacklists
   
   
   • Should I update the kernel
   
   


2. 
   

   What steps should be taken after the installation of the new GPU.

   
   
   
   • Should I install the drivers from NVIDIA site by running their .run file or rather install the older version drivers from debian repository
   
   
   • Will the desktop environment (XFCE) run on Nouvea drivers after reboot before new drivers are installed?
   
   

I have found NVidia GTX 1080 installation on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS step-by-step guide but It relates to Ubintu 16.04 which is running different kernel, also not a TI version, so not sure if I won't run in some issues by following its steps.

Please do not consider this question as a duplicate. I have seen many post about how to install nvidia drivers, my question has broader context - how to prepare for the upgrade in order to run it safely and minimize possible issues.