Weird Nvidia/X/console problem

[den_RDC]

I have a small problem with my nvidia card/drivers, X and the console. Everything works perfect, but for an unknown reason both my monitors switch into standby mode when i exit X. I don't get my console back, but the machine doesn't hang either, their's just no outpu anymore. I can restart X "blind" and that does work. I tried different 2.6 kernels, vesa fb, regular plain old console, nothing helps.
I am using nvidias 1.0.5328-r1 drivers on a quadro4 900 xgl, using the kernel's agpgart. Any ideas?

[feystorm]

i have a similar problem. I only have 1 monitor, but with any nvidia driver version greater than 4363, it doesnt work for me. when i first boot the computer, i can see my console fine, then i start x, everything still works fine. but then when i quit x and go back to console, or even switch to a console from x (ctrl+alt+f[1-5]), i get a really screwed up display. colored lines going down the screen, with the lines all screwed up where text would have been, completely unreadable. and if i actually quit x, i can blind restart it too, and it comes back up fine.

ive been just using the 4363 drivers, but now that i have kernel 2.6, they dont compile, only the newer drivers compile, but are all screwed up (this problem existed in both kernel 2.4 and 2.6). (ive also tried the newer 5336 ones, same thing)

I run a geforce 3 ti200 128mb, and i use nvagp, not agpgart.
kernel 2.6.2-rc2-aa1, gcc 3.2.3, and glibc 2.3.2

[azlan]

which vga type did you set for the framebuffer in your kernel compile.

after your nvidia kernel loads ie when you startx if you are using for instance svga it might not work anymore.

I would try building the kernel with a differnent framebuffer driver, or opt some of them out.
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there is no crazy, only violet and non violet..

[feystorm]

i didnt build the kerel with any framebuffer, i hate framebuffer. the only thing i have going is vgamodes which is a bios thing rather than kernel thing.

[Leprechaun]

https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=120279&highlight=

Hope that helps.

[feystorm]

well, i dont have an alternate device like a tv or anything, all i have is my one lonely little monitor. also, when i quit X, it doesnt lock up, i can still type and restart X, i just cant see what im doing
Ive also ended up having to rebuild my system from scratch due to hard drive failure. so completely new configs, and it did it with the old system too. same hardware, just differant hard drive.

[ennoia]

I have the same problem, and after hours of searching have not found a solution that works...

does anyone know how to fix this?

or should I just wait a bit for stable nvidia drivers? back to running 2.4 ... it's too bad too, 2.6 is a lot faster. The "random garbage screen of doom" makes it not worth it though

[Javier Lopez]

[ennoia]

Tried that.. no diffrence

[Zzoot]

Same problem here... From all the searching I've done, this looks to have been a problem for around a year now, judging from the complaints...

Here's what I've got goin...
vpr matrix 220A5 Laptop
Geforce420go chipset graphics
1280x854 lcd panel widescreen
Nvidia-Kernel 1.0.4496-r3
Xfree86 4.3
Kernel--Gentoo-Sources 2.4.25
(current, but not ~arch)

I have tried with and without vesa fb, bootsplash, normal coarse console... everything I can think of for kernel options compiled into or left out.
The console looks just fine, until I start X, at which point, I never see the console again until I reboot it. I can still type after switching to alt-F2, etc...Its just blank, so I can't really see what I'm typing. I can switch back to X just fine.

I haven't tried any "IgnoreDisplayDevices" type options, as I occaisionally use the laptop as a Video player on my tv, so I actually USE that second display every so often...

After this long, I'm guessing that this is an Nvidia-bug, as it was apparantly fine until after the 4363 drivers. Unfortunately, I haven't found any resources on NVidia's website detailing this one either... This is funny, as the main reason I like Nvidia hardware is that they're usually on the ball about fixing things and releasing new drivers on a regular schedule... Oh well...time for an email to nvidia...

[theJPster]

I get the display corruption when I leave X too, but only when I have TV-Out enabled. I have added two extra "ServerLayouts" to my XF86Config file to cure the problem. If I start with "startx -- -layout Mon" the TV out is turned off and all is well. If I start with "startx -- -layout MonTV", I get the TV as a second desktop, but if I switch out of X all I see is rubbish. "-layout MonTVT" enables the TV as part of TwinView. That, I believe, also causes graphic corruption.

I can clear the rubbish up sometimes by running "setfont default8x9" (or whatever my console font is set too) blind, but then it often has problems with the number of lines on the screen. If I run a command a few times like, say, 'ls', the results eventually end up off of the bottom of the screen and the display doesn't scroll to show them. If I hold down 'Enter' and stick in a load of blank lines, eventually it does hit the 'bottom' and start everything scrolling up. It's annoying enough that I usually start without the TV enabled.

It's happened in all nvidia drivers I've tried in 2.4.x and 2.6.x. I'm in 2.4.x with stable 4xxx series drivers at the moment and it's still bugging me.
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theJPster

[Skotlex]

Well I can add but little to the already known problem.
Indeed, as people have reported, the vga-console corruption is generally caused when the nvidia drivers try to set up tv-out.
The corruption happens even if you don't have bootsplash enabled. Actually, I've noticed this behavior which might somehow point at what could be the cause of the problem:
You see, if I set my console font to something smaller than the default (because we all want more output on the console), eventually when switching between X and the console the console size "resets", meaning I get back those big default console fonts, and when this happens is that I get the "no auto-scrolling" problem (because the logical screen size is actually bigger than your actual display size, the text on the bottom of the screen is not visible).

Only other thing I can add, is that since I changed to X.org's servers, things got worse. When initializing tv-out, my tv's screen flickers a bit, then goes back to black. So now I don't have tv-out working and as a freebie I got a corrupted console

If the nvidia-drivers were open-source, we'd had a load of people fixing it since long ago, but I suppose all we can do is get a load of people to mail them and ask for a fix? (Altough they likely won't try to fix it if you tell them the problem is related to the framebuffer, because if I am not mistaken, the driver's documentation says it's a bad idea having two drivers handling the same hardware device...).

[polle]

I got this also but only using bootsplash and the nvtv (tv out for nvidia) when I removed nvtv from the default level problem was solved

[Skystroller]

This issue seems to me to be related to the TVout stuff. Since at first I was using a noname GF 3 Ti200 and everything worked as it should, but then I exchanged it for a GF 4 Ti4200 and my console started to dissapear. As far as I know one of the differences between the GF3 and GF4 is the tv out and the ability to have twin view, correct?

[Skotlex]

[MaDxRaY]

[dextur]

Ahh the

[soverton71]

This probably won't help, but I stumbled upon a solution for a similar problem with my old Voodoo4 card:
When I Ctrl-Alt-F1 to get a console, there's random garbage on the screen.
I can Alt-Right, then Alt-Left and the console is refreshed!

Sometimes, usually when I'm playing around with a new /etc/XF86Config and kill the X server, I'll come back to a console that has noise on the upper third of the screen, and doubled horizontally, so that there are two copies of the console side by side in a really teeny tiney font. The solution to this, since I usually am already logged into the console when this happens, is to run "fbset -xres 640" and the console returns to normal.

Incidentally, the "fbset" thing also works for the first problem, but it's just easier to Alt-Right,Alt-Left to clear it up.