[gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Walter Dnes]

  Back around 2000, we still had CRT monitors, not LCDs.  The cheaper
monitors shimmered badly in GUI mode and were hard on my eyes.  One of
the factors that drove me to linux back then was that, except for web
browsing and spreadsheets, I could do most of my work in a true text
console (and I don't mean an xterm, either).  I love sharp crisp
textmode fonts on a text console.  I used to do email and write code in
text consoles, and {CTRL-ALT-F10} to GUI for browsing (yes, I tweaked my
/etc/inittab to allow 10 consoles).

  Recently, however, video drivers for both Intel and ATI have switched
over to some brain-dead framebuffer mode that renders regular
consolefonts microscopic.  Also the line lengths are ridiculously long.
E.g. on my 1920x1200 LCD monitor, an 8x16 font gives 75 rows of 240
columns each.  On my 14" notebook (1366x768) it's 48 rows of 170 columns
each.  The largest consolefont I can find in /usr/share/consolefonts/ is
sun12x22.  It's large enough to be at least readable, but I don't like
the way the font looks, and it's still too small for my taste, 54 rows
of 160 columns each on the LCD monitor.

  My questions, in decreasing order of preference, are...

Plan a) Is there a way to have a real text console?  I know that I can
have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
colour depths.  Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
ability to have X run at 1920x1200?

Plan b) Are there extra large versions of lat1-?? fonts (24 pixels wide
for my 24" LED and 17 pixels wide for my notebook) that I can use in
framebuffer mode to emulate the look of real text mode?

Plan c) Are there any font-design and manipulation utilities that will
allow me to modify lat1-?? fonts to generate bigger versions?

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>

Re: [gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Johannes Kimmel]

On 02/03/2011 07:07 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
>    Back around 2000, we still had CRT monitors, not LCDs.  The cheaper
> monitors shimmered badly in GUI mode and were hard on my eyes.  One of
> the factors that drove me to linux back then was that, except for web
> browsing and spreadsheets, I could do most of my work in a true text
> console (and I don't mean an xterm, either).  I love sharp crisp
> textmode fonts on a text console.  I used to do email and write code in
> text consoles, and {CTRL-ALT-F10} to GUI for browsing (yes, I tweaked my
> /etc/inittab to allow 10 consoles).
>
>    Recently, however, video drivers for both Intel and ATI have switched
> over to some brain-dead framebuffer mode that renders regular
> consolefonts microscopic.  Also the line lengths are ridiculously long.
> E.g. on my 1920x1200 LCD monitor, an 8x16 font gives 75 rows of 240
> columns each.  On my 14" notebook (1366x768) it's 48 rows of 170 columns
> each.  The largest consolefont I can find in /usr/share/consolefonts/ is
> sun12x22.  It's large enough to be at least readable, but I don't like
> the way the font looks, and it's still too small for my taste, 54 rows
> of 160 columns each on the LCD monitor.
>
>    My questions, in decreasing order of preference, are...
>
> Plan a) Is there a way to have a real text console?  I know that I can
> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
> colour depths.  Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?
>
> Plan b) Are there extra large versions of lat1-?? fonts (24 pixels wide
> for my 24" LED and 17 pixels wide for my notebook) that I can use in
> framebuffer mode to emulate the look of real text mode?
>
> Plan c) Are there any font-design and manipulation utilities that will
> allow me to modify lat1-?? fonts to generate bigger versions?
>

Maybe you should also try using a tiling-window-manager like awesome or 
xmonad. This way you can easily switch between consoles and most 
x-terminals support a lot of fonts.

Johannes Kimmel

Re: [gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Paul Hartman]

On Thu, Feb 3, 2011 at 12:07 AM, Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org> wrote:
>  Recently, however, video drivers for both Intel and ATI have switched
> over to some brain-dead framebuffer mode that renders regular
> consolefonts microscopic.  Also the line lengths are ridiculously long.

Sounds like KMS perhaps. Try to add "nomodeset" to your kernel boot
command-line to disable it and see how that goes.

Alternately don't use the KMS driver at all, disable all
framebuffer/bootsplash stuff, don't use vga=xyz on your kernel
command-line if it's there. (I don't know if avoiding KMS is always
possible, at least with my laptop's ATI chipset I still have the
choice to use the old driver)

Worst-case scenario, use fbset and setfont to set a resolution and
font size that is a close approximation to what you are comfortable
with, then make it permanent in the kernel command-line and
consolefont settings.

Re: [gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Mick]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: Text/Plain, Size: 2024 bytes --]

On Thursday 03 February 2011 06:07:55 Walter Dnes wrote:
>   Back around 2000, we still had CRT monitors, not LCDs.  The cheaper
> monitors shimmered badly in GUI mode and were hard on my eyes.  One of
> the factors that drove me to linux back then was that, except for web
> browsing and spreadsheets, I could do most of my work in a true text
> console (and I don't mean an xterm, either).  I love sharp crisp
> textmode fonts on a text console.  I used to do email and write code in
> text consoles, and {CTRL-ALT-F10} to GUI for browsing (yes, I tweaked my
> /etc/inittab to allow 10 consoles).
> 
>   Recently, however, video drivers for both Intel and ATI have switched
> over to some brain-dead framebuffer mode that renders regular
> consolefonts microscopic.  Also the line lengths are ridiculously long.
> E.g. on my 1920x1200 LCD monitor, an 8x16 font gives 75 rows of 240
> columns each.  On my 14" notebook (1366x768) it's 48 rows of 170 columns
> each.  The largest consolefont I can find in /usr/share/consolefonts/ is
> sun12x22.  It's large enough to be at least readable, but I don't like
> the way the font looks, and it's still too small for my taste, 54 rows
> of 160 columns each on the LCD monitor.
> 
>   My questions, in decreasing order of preference, are...
> 
> Plan a) Is there a way to have a real text console?  I know that I can
> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
> colour depths.  Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?

Yes.

Leave KMS enabled and add the parameter:

  video=1024x768 (or whatever suits your screen and taste)

to your kernel line.  You shouldn't need vesafb, uvesa or any other drivers to 
achieve this.

Read more here: /Documentation/fb/modedb.txt

I think that if you revert to a framebuffer driver then you must add nomodeset 
on your kernel line.
-- 
Regards,
Mick

[-- Attachment #2: This is a digitally signed message part. --]
[-- Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 198 bytes --]

Re: [gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Walter Dnes]

On Thu, Feb 03, 2011 at 09:40:41PM +0000, Mick wrote

> Leave KMS enabled and add the parameter:
> 
>   video=1024x768 (or whatever suits your screen and taste)
> 
> to your kernel line.  You shouldn't need vesafb, uvesa or any other
> drivers to achieve this.

  Thanks very much.  That works.  I feel stupid.  I always used "VGA=6"
to get the equivalant of "video=640x480".  When "VGA=6" stopped working,
it didn't occur to me to try "video=640x480", because I assumed they
were identical.

  Anyhow, I'm typing this in a text console.  /etc/conf.d/consolefont is

CONSOLEFONT="lat1-10"

  Combine that with 640x480 video, and that gives me an 80x48 textmode
display.  Because I'm using a 10-pixel-high font, the text is a lot
nicer than VGA 80x50 that you may have seen on Windows.  That mode uses
an 8-pixel-high font on a 640x400 display for 50 rows.  Doing an "ll"
finds more lat1-?? fonts in /usr/share/consolefonts, which give the
following possible text displays for "video=640x480"...

lat1-08 ==> 80x60
lat1-10 ==> 80x48
lat1-12 ==> 80x40
lat1-14 ==> 80x34
lat1-16 ==> 80x30

  As they say in the infomercials "but wait, there's more".  My monitor
supports 1280x720 and 1280x1024 modes.  Using "screen" I should be able
to do splitscreen mode with 2 sessions side-by-each.  Or vim in one
screen with :vsplit splitting into two subscreens.  Possibilities
include two side-by-each sessions of...

Font      1280x720  1280x1024

lat1-08 ==> 80x90   80x128
lat1-10 ==> 80x72   80x102
lat1-12 ==> 80x60   80x85
lat1-14 ==> 80x51   80x73
lat1-16 ==> 80x45   80x64

  I feel like a kid with a shiney new toy.  And when prices for 30 inch
monitors come down, I could go nuts with *THREE* 80-column screens
side-by-each in 1920x1200 or 1920x1080 video mode.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>

Re: [gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Mick]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: Text/Plain, Size: 2014 bytes --]

On Saturday 05 February 2011 17:10:15 Walter Dnes wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 03, 2011 at 09:40:41PM +0000, Mick wrote
> 
> > Leave KMS enabled and add the parameter:
> >   video=1024x768 (or whatever suits your screen and taste)
> > 
> > to your kernel line.  You shouldn't need vesafb, uvesa or any other
> > drivers to achieve this.
> 
>   Thanks very much.  That works.  I feel stupid.  I always used "VGA=6"
> to get the equivalant of "video=640x480".  When "VGA=6" stopped working,
> it didn't occur to me to try "video=640x480", because I assumed they
> were identical.
> 
>   Anyhow, I'm typing this in a text console.  /etc/conf.d/consolefont is
> 
> CONSOLEFONT="lat1-10"
> 
>   Combine that with 640x480 video, and that gives me an 80x48 textmode
> display.  Because I'm using a 10-pixel-high font, the text is a lot
> nicer than VGA 80x50 that you may have seen on Windows.  That mode uses
> an 8-pixel-high font on a 640x400 display for 50 rows.  Doing an "ll"
> finds more lat1-?? fonts in /usr/share/consolefonts, which give the
> following possible text displays for "video=640x480"...
> 
> lat1-08 ==> 80x60
> lat1-10 ==> 80x48
> lat1-12 ==> 80x40
> lat1-14 ==> 80x34
> lat1-16 ==> 80x30
> 
>   As they say in the infomercials "but wait, there's more".  My monitor
> supports 1280x720 and 1280x1024 modes.  Using "screen" I should be able
> to do splitscreen mode with 2 sessions side-by-each.  Or vim in one
> screen with :vsplit splitting into two subscreens.  Possibilities
> include two side-by-each sessions of...
> 
> Font      1280x720  1280x1024
> 
> lat1-08 ==> 80x90   80x128
> lat1-10 ==> 80x72   80x102
> lat1-12 ==> 80x60   80x85
> lat1-14 ==> 80x51   80x73
> lat1-16 ==> 80x45   80x64
> 
>   I feel like a kid with a shiney new toy.  And when prices for 30 inch
> monitors come down, I could go nuts with *THREE* 80-column screens
> side-by-each in 1920x1200 or 1920x1080 video mode.

Glad you cracked this one.  :-)  
-- 
Regards,
Mick

[-- Attachment #2: This is a digitally signed message part. --]
[-- Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 198 bytes --]

Re: [gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Walter Dnes]

On Sat, Feb 05, 2011 at 12:10:15PM -0500, Walter Dnes wrote

>   As they say in the infomercials "but wait, there's more".  My monitor
> supports 1280x720 and 1280x1024 modes.  Using "screen" I should be able
> to do splitscreen mode with 2 sessions side-by-each.

  That is going to have to wait a while.  I knew it should be there, but
the vertical split doesn't show up.  I did some Google searching.
http://www.linux.com/learn/tutorials/285795-taking-command-of-the-terminal-with-gnu-screen-
says...

> Some newer releases of screen (later than 4.0.3-10) also support
> windows split vertically. To split a screen vertically, use Ctrl-a |
> and then Ctrl-a Tab to enter the new window. To start a new shell
> in that window, use Ctrl-a c or use Ctrl-a " to choose an existing
> session to display in that window.

  The current ebuild is screen-4.0.3, and up to screen-4.0.3-r4 (with
~everything) shows up after an "emerge --sync".  I can
"./configure --with-various-options && make && make install" with the
best of them (not that I know what I'm doing<G>), but the latest builds
of "screen" are in a git repository, which I'm not familiar with.  Plus
which, these builds could be alpha or very early beta, so I don't really
want to use them on a production machine.  Keywording ~amd64 ebuilds is
as much "bleeding edge" as I want to go.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>

[gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[walt]

On 02/05/2011 03:43 PM, Walter Dnes wrote:

> the latest builds
> of "screen" are in a git repository, which I'm not familiar with.

(I'm not the same Walter, as you know already :)

I urge everyone to get to know git.

I admit, I could be prejudiced in git's favor just because it was the
first vcs I learned after cvs, but git is going to gain market share
just because Linus is who he is.

I've now used svn (barf!), bzr (to track grub2), mercurial (to track
thunderbird and firefox), and the ancient cvs (which is jumping head
first into its grave).

I omitted bitkeeper from the list because it's a closed-source product,
but Linus has given credit to bitkeeper's creator for inspiring him to
write git in the first place.  (I barely remember using bitkeeper.)

Maybe I just think like Linus, I dunno, but for me git "just works",
unlike its competitors -- svn in particular, which has earned a very
special place in my personal software hell.

Re: [gentoo-user] Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Willie Wong]

On Sat, Feb 05, 2011 at 06:43:32PM -0500, Walter Dnes wrote:
>   The current ebuild is screen-4.0.3, and up to screen-4.0.3-r4 (with
> ~everything) shows up after an "emerge --sync".  I can
> "./configure --with-various-options && make && make install" with the
> best of them (not that I know what I'm doing<G>), but the latest builds
> of "screen" are in a git repository, which I'm not familiar with.  Plus
> which, these builds could be alpha or very early beta, so I don't really
> want to use them on a production machine.  Keywording ~amd64 ebuilds is
> as much "bleeding edge" as I want to go.

May be you want to try 'tmux', which was discussed on this list a
short while ago. The key combo for vertical splitting is C-b %

Since version 1.2 it supports vertical and horizontal splitting,
version 1.3 in portage is amd64, and 1.4 is ~amd64.

W
-- 
Willie W. Wong                                     wwong@math.princeton.edu
Data aequatione quotcunque fluentes quantitae involvente fluxiones invenire 
         et vice versa   ~~~  I. Newton

[gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 02/03/2011 08:07 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
> Is there a way to have a real text console?  I know that I can
> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
> colour depths.  Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?

Note that the suggestion the others gave about disabling KMS is probably 
not what you need.  Disabling KMS means that it will also be disabled 
for X11, not only for the framebuffer.  As you can imagine this is a bad 
thing.

[gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[walt]

On 02/03/2011 02:11 PM, Nikos Chantziaras wrote:
> On 02/03/2011 08:07 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
>> Is there a way to have a real text console? I know that I can
>> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
>> colour depths. Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
>> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
>> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?
>
> Note that the suggestion the others gave about disabling KMS is  probably
>not what you need. Disabling KMS means that it will also be disabled for
>X11, not only for the framebuffer. As you can imagine this is a bad thing.

I'm aware of KMS because of my experiments with the 'nouveau' driver, but
I still have no idea what KMS really does.

In other words, I *cannot* imagine why disabling KMS is a bad thing, but I
would very much like to know :)

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Alan McKinnon]

Apparently, though unproven, at 02:05 on Friday 04 February 2011, walt did 
opine thusly:

> On 02/03/2011 02:11 PM, Nikos Chantziaras wrote:
> > On 02/03/2011 08:07 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
> >> Is there a way to have a real text console? I know that I can
> >> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
> >> colour depths. Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
> >> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
> >> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?
> > 
> > Note that the suggestion the others gave about disabling KMS is  probably
> >
> >not what you need. Disabling KMS means that it will also be disabled for
> >X11, not only for the framebuffer. As you can imagine this is a bad thing.
> 
> I'm aware of KMS because of my experiments with the 'nouveau' driver, but
> I still have no idea what KMS really does.
> 
> In other words, I *cannot* imagine why disabling KMS is a bad thing, but I
> would very much like to know :)

Very short answer:

Without KMS, changing video modes or changing from console to X requires a 
fantastically gigantic amount of swapping running code in and out, handing 
over control of the graphics hardware for one driver to another, and is a 
magnificent bug-injection mechanism. It's why it takes 2-3 seconds to switch 
from X to tty1 and why some hardware flickers like in banshee while doing it.

KMS removes the need for the video driver to be aware of all the nonsense that 
requires. The driver no longer needs to get up close and personal with 
everything else the kernel is doing and make really sure it's timing is really 
right. Of course, the video driver has to support KMS for this to work. nVidia 
doesn't, nouveau does.

In fact, nouveau *requires* KMS. It's such a good idea that the nouveau devs 
decided they were simply not going to support no-KMS.

Disabling KMS (if it works with your hardware and drivers) in general is a bad 
idea as you lose all that nice KMS goodness. It's an especially bad idea with 
nouveau as the video hardware stops working at all.





-- 
alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Enrico Weigelt]

* Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon@gmail.com> wrote:

> KMS removes the need for the video driver to be aware of all
> the nonsense that requires. The driver no longer needs to get
> up close and personal with everything else the kernel is doing
> and make really sure it's timing is really right. Of course,
> the video driver has to support KMS for this to work. nVidia 
> doesn't, nouveau does.

AFAIK, KMS moves parts of the video driver's jobs to kernelspace.
Mode switching from userland (more precisely: done by X) always
has been a tricky and unstable thing, eg. crashing Xserver leaving
behind usuable console. That should be gone w/ KMS (admitting,
I didn't really test it yet).


cu
-- 
----------------------------------------------------------------------
 Enrico Weigelt, metux IT service -- http://www.metux.de/

 phone:  +49 36207 519931  email: weigelt@metux.de
 mobile: +49 151 27565287  icq:   210169427         skype: nekrad666
----------------------------------------------------------------------
 Embedded-Linux / Portierung / Opensource-QM / Verteilte Systeme
----------------------------------------------------------------------

[gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 02/04/2011 02:05 AM, walt wrote:
> On 02/03/2011 02:11 PM, Nikos Chantziaras wrote:
>> On 02/03/2011 08:07 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
>>> Is there a way to have a real text console? I know that I can
>>> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
>>> colour depths. Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
>>> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
>>> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?
>>
>> Note that the suggestion the others gave about disabling KMS is probably
>> not what you need. Disabling KMS means that it will also be disabled for
>> X11, not only for the framebuffer. As you can imagine this is a bad
>> thing.
>
> I'm aware of KMS because of my experiments with the 'nouveau' driver, but
> I still have no idea what KMS really does.
>
> In other words, I *cannot* imagine why disabling KMS is a bad thing, but I
> would very much like to know :)

For the radeon driver at least, disabling KMS means that you won't get 
DRI2 in X11.  That means slower performance and tearing.  The non-KMS X 
driver is pretty much considered deprecated.

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Paul Hartman]

On Thu, Feb 3, 2011 at 6:37 PM, Nikos Chantziaras <realnc@arcor.de> wrote:
> On 02/04/2011 02:05 AM, walt wrote:
>>
>> On 02/03/2011 02:11 PM, Nikos Chantziaras wrote:
>>>
>>> On 02/03/2011 08:07 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Is there a way to have a real text console? I know that I can
>>>> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
>>>> colour depths. Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
>>>> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
>>>> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?
>>>
>>> Note that the suggestion the others gave about disabling KMS is probably
>>> not what you need. Disabling KMS means that it will also be disabled for
>>> X11, not only for the framebuffer. As you can imagine this is a bad
>>> thing.
>>
>> I'm aware of KMS because of my experiments with the 'nouveau' driver, but
>> I still have no idea what KMS really does.
>>
>> In other words, I *cannot* imagine why disabling KMS is a bad thing, but I
>> would very much like to know :)
>
> For the radeon driver at least, disabling KMS means that you won't get DRI2
> in X11.  That means slower performance and tearing.  The non-KMS X driver is
> pretty much considered deprecated.

Anecdote: On my laptop, which has a Radeon Mobility 9700 (uses RV350
or RV360), I got 30fps in Sauerbraten using the old non-KMS radeon
driver, and only 15fps using the new KMS driver. Enabling gallium on
latest mesa improves that to about 18fps, but causes my computer to
crash after a few minutes...

Both of them are slower than the proprietary ati-drivers used to be,
but I stopped using those a long time ago (and they don't support my
card anymore anyway).

[gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 02/04/2011 08:10 PM, Paul Hartman wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 3, 2011 at 6:37 PM, Nikos Chantziaras<realnc@arcor.de>  wrote:
>>  [...]
>> For the radeon driver at least, disabling KMS means that you won't get DRI2
>> in X11.  That means slower performance and tearing.  The non-KMS X driver is
>> pretty much considered deprecated.
>
> Anecdote: On my laptop, which has a Radeon Mobility 9700 (uses RV350
> or RV360), I got 30fps in Sauerbraten using the old non-KMS radeon
> driver, and only 15fps using the new KMS driver. Enabling gallium on
> latest mesa improves that to about 18fps, but causes my computer to
> crash after a few minutes...

Sounds like a very outdated driver to me.

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Walter Dnes]

On Thu, Feb 03, 2011 at 04:05:01PM -0800, walt wrote
> On 02/03/2011 02:11 PM, Nikos Chantziaras wrote:
> > On 02/03/2011 08:07 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
> >> Is there a way to have a real text console? I know that I can
> >> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
> >> colour depths. Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
> >> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
> >> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?
> >
> > Note that the suggestion the others gave about disabling KMS is  probably
> >not what you need. Disabling KMS means that it will also be disabled for
> >X11, not only for the framebuffer. As you can imagine this is a bad thing.
> 
> I'm aware of KMS because of my experiments with the 'nouveau' driver, but
> I still have no idea what KMS really does.
> 
> In other words, I *cannot* imagine why disabling KMS is a bad thing, but I
> would very much like to know :)

  Walt, Alan, Enrico, Nikos see the thread "Not getting video hardware
acceleration" that I started on January 31.  Without KMS, and the
resulting DRI2 acceleration, my laptop could not run mplayer fast enough
to keep up with an HDTV feed.  With KMS, which is required by the bibary
blob in the new Radeon driver, it works fine.  The documentation at
http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/xorg-config.xml requires KMS for newer ATI
Radeon cards.

  In "make menuconfig", I do not have any drivers enabled under...
    Device Drivers  --->
      Graphics support  --->
      -*- Support for frame buffer devices  --->
but I still have /dev/fb0 show up.  Under...
      Console display driver support  --->
the line...
      -*- Framebuffer Console support
indicates that framebuffer console support is enabled, whether I like it
or not.  This is part and parcel of the ARI Radeon driver.  Without it,
no X.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Mick]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: Text/Plain, Size: 2260 bytes --]

On Saturday 05 February 2011 15:27:27 Walter Dnes wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 03, 2011 at 04:05:01PM -0800, walt wrote
> 
> > On 02/03/2011 02:11 PM, Nikos Chantziaras wrote:
> > > On 02/03/2011 08:07 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
> > >> Is there a way to have a real text console? I know that I can
> > >> have 2 X sessions on tty10 and tty11 with different resolutions, and
> > >> colour depths. Is there a way to set tty1..tty9 to 640x480 *IN TEXT
> > >> MODE*, so that lat1-?? fonts would look normal, without killing the
> > >> ability to have X run at 1920x1200?
> > > 
> > > Note that the suggestion the others gave about disabling KMS is 
> > > probably
> > >
> > >not what you need. Disabling KMS means that it will also be disabled for
> > >X11, not only for the framebuffer. As you can imagine this is a bad
> > >thing.
> > 
> > I'm aware of KMS because of my experiments with the 'nouveau' driver, but
> > I still have no idea what KMS really does.
> > 
> > In other words, I *cannot* imagine why disabling KMS is a bad thing, but
> > I would very much like to know :)
> 
>   Walt, Alan, Enrico, Nikos see the thread "Not getting video hardware
> acceleration" that I started on January 31.  Without KMS, and the
> resulting DRI2 acceleration, my laptop could not run mplayer fast enough
> to keep up with an HDTV feed.  With KMS, which is required by the bibary
> blob in the new Radeon driver, it works fine.  The documentation at
> http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/xorg-config.xml requires KMS for newer ATI
> Radeon cards.
> 
>   In "make menuconfig", I do not have any drivers enabled under...
>     Device Drivers  --->
>       Graphics support  --->
>       -*- Support for frame buffer devices  --->
> but I still have /dev/fb0 show up.  Under...
>       Console display driver support  --->
> the line...
>       -*- Framebuffer Console support
> indicates that framebuffer console support is enabled, whether I like it
> or not.  This is part and parcel of the ARI Radeon driver.  Without it,
> no X.

Right, but a framebuffer (KMS driven or vesa, et al.) is not a bad thing.  
Just try video=1024x768 (or whatever your desired resolution is) on the kernel 
line and it should just work.
-- 
Regards,
Mick

[-- Attachment #2: This is a digitally signed message part. --]
[-- Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 198 bytes --]

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Mick]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: Text/Plain, Size: 998 bytes --]

On Saturday 05 February 2011 18:00:10 Mick wrote:
> On Saturday 05 February 2011 15:27:27 Walter Dnes wrote:

> >   In "make menuconfig", I do not have any drivers enabled under...
> >   
> >     Device Drivers  --->
> >     
> >       Graphics support  --->
> >       -*- Support for frame buffer devices  --->
> > 
> > but I still have /dev/fb0 show up.  Under...
> > 
> >       Console display driver support  --->
> > 
> > the line...
> > 
> >       -*- Framebuffer Console support
> > 
> > indicates that framebuffer console support is enabled, whether I like it
> > or not.  This is part and parcel of the ARI Radeon driver.  Without it,
> > no X.
> 
> Right, but a framebuffer (KMS driven or vesa, et al.) is not a bad thing.
> Just try video=1024x768 (or whatever your desired resolution is) on the
> kernel line and it should just work.

Oops!  Walter please ignore this message ... I just saw that you have solved 
it on your later reply.
-- 
Regards,
Mick

[-- Attachment #2: This is a digitally signed message part. --]
[-- Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 198 bytes --]

[gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 02/05/2011 08:00 PM, Mick wrote:
>
> Right, but a framebuffer (KMS driven or vesa, et al.) is not a bad thing.
> Just try video=1024x768 (or whatever your desired resolution is) on the kernel
> line and it should just work.

Unfortunately, it doesn't.

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Walter Dnes]

On Sat, Feb 05, 2011 at 09:31:48PM +0200, Nikos Chantziaras wrote
> On 02/05/2011 08:00 PM, Mick wrote:
> >
> > Just try video=1024x768 (or whatever your desired resolution is)
> > on the kernel line and it should just work.
> 
> Unfortunately, it doesn't.

  Actually, it does, "video=640x480" in my case.  The weird part is that
the equivalant "VGA=6" option no longer works, which is what got me to
start this thread in the first place.  I had simply assumed that they
were identical, and if one doesn't work, neither does the other.

  Note that this is just for text consoles, X remains at 1920x1200 for
me.  Of course, the monitor has to support whatever text console
resolution you ask for.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>

[gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 02/06/2011 01:54 AM, Walter Dnes wrote:
> On Sat, Feb 05, 2011 at 09:31:48PM +0200, Nikos Chantziaras wrote
>> On 02/05/2011 08:00 PM, Mick wrote:
>>>
>>> Just try video=1024x768 (or whatever your desired resolution is)
>>> on the kernel line and it should just work.
>>
>> Unfortunately, it doesn't.
>
>    Actually, it does, "video=640x480" in my case.  The weird part is that
> the equivalant "VGA=6" option no longer works, which is what got me to
> start this thread in the first place.  I had simply assumed that they
> were identical, and if one doesn't work, neither does the other.
>
>    Note that this is just for text consoles, X remains at 1920x1200 for
> me.  Of course, the monitor has to support whatever text console
> resolution you ask for.

What graphics card are you using?  I can't make it work here using the 
radeon driver.

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Walter Dnes]

On Sun, Feb 06, 2011 at 03:07:59AM +0200, Nikos Chantziaras wrote

  From "lspci -v"...

01:05.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Device 9712
(prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
        Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device 0372
        Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 18
        Memory at c0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
        I/O ports at 9000 [size=256]
        Memory at d0100000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
        Memory at d0000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1M]
        Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
        Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 3
        Capabilities: [a0] MSI: Enable- Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+
        Kernel driver in use: radeon

01:05.1 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc Device 970f
        Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device 0372
        Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 19
        Memory at d0110000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
        Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 3
        Capabilities: [a0] MSI: Enable- Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+
        Kernel driver in use: HDA Inte

  Are you sure you're requesting a supported mode?  Execute...

grep Modeline /var/log/Xorg.0.log

...and see if the mode you want is in the list.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any way to get real text console without killing X capability?

[Mick]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: Text/Plain, Size: 1846 bytes --]

On Monday 07 February 2011 16:51:28 Walter Dnes wrote:
> On Sun, Feb 06, 2011 at 03:07:59AM +0200, Nikos Chantziaras wrote
> 
>   From "lspci -v"...
> 
> 01:05.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Device 9712
> (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
>         Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device 0372
>         Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 18
>         Memory at c0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
>         I/O ports at 9000 [size=256]
>         Memory at d0100000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
>         Memory at d0000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1M]
>         Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
>         Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 3
>         Capabilities: [a0] MSI: Enable- Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+
>         Kernel driver in use: radeon
> 
> 01:05.1 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc Device 970f
>         Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device 0372
>         Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 19
>         Memory at d0110000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
>         Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 3
>         Capabilities: [a0] MSI: Enable- Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+
>         Kernel driver in use: HDA Inte
> 
>   Are you sure you're requesting a supported mode?  Execute...
> 
> grep Modeline /var/log/Xorg.0.log
> 
> ...and see if the mode you want is in the list.

I'm also using the radeon driver.  It works here for different resolutions 
irrespective of the native resolution of the screen.  Of course if the 
selected resolution is not a multiple of the native screen size then the fonts 
are distorted, but display all the same.

It should be able to display whatever your card can do - but of course not all 
resolutions that you may think of.

HTH.
-- 
Regards,
Mick

[-- Attachment #2: This is a digitally signed message part. --]
[-- Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 198 bytes --]