bug report: i945 text-mode native graphics initialization: graphical corruption with starting Debian/Trisquel net installer.
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Using 6725 to enable text-mode gfx init on X60 when using native graphics initialization.
Affected machines: X60, T60. It may also affect: macbook21/macbook11, X60 Tablet
This relies on the (merged) patch 6723 that enables text-mode graphics initialization on i945 platforms. The code is there.
I then disabled "Keep VESA framebuffer" in menuconfig, to enable text-mode.
error: no video mode activated This is what I see when I try to use the net install iso for Debian with the isolinux parser in grub. I also saw the same thing when trying to start Trisquel 6 isolinux menu from SeaBIOS (with SeaVGABIOS added at vgaroms/vgabios.bin from seabios's rom that I built).
See attached image of what happens when I try to boot the net install from Debian (same thing happens with the Trisquel net install), using the following: linux (usb0)/install.386/vmlinuz initrd (usb0)/install.386/initrd.gz boot
As you can see, there is quite a lot of flicker and parts of the screen are missing or corrupt. I think this is related to the issue above ("error: no video mode activated").
The net install for Debian and Trisquel both work when using corebootfb initialization method, but they fail (as seen in the image) for text-mode method.
In case the attachment was scrubbed by the mailing list, I also put it here: http://dev.libreboot.org/x60txtmode.jpg
Trisquel graphical install works (I wasn't able to figure out how to boot the Debian graphical install).
I also enabled it for T60 (adding the keep/drop vesa fb option for t60/Kconfig, based on 6725, and cherry picking 5345) and the same behaviour was observed there.
What does work in text-mode init (tested): memtest86+ and grub invaders.
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The same issue does not occur when using coreboot with the vga rom extracted from factory bios.
On 25/08/14 16:50, The Gluglug wrote:
Using 6725 to enable text-mode gfx init on X60 when using native graphics initialization.
Affected machines: X60, T60. It may also affect: macbook21/macbook11, X60 Tablet
This relies on the (merged) patch 6723 that enables text-mode graphics initialization on i945 platforms. The code is there.
I then disabled "Keep VESA framebuffer" in menuconfig, to enable text-mode.
error: no video mode activated This is what I see when I try to use the net install iso for Debian with the isolinux parser in grub. I also saw the same thing when trying to start Trisquel 6 isolinux menu from SeaBIOS (with SeaVGABIOS added at vgaroms/vgabios.bin from seabios's rom that I built).
See attached image of what happens when I try to boot the net install from Debian (same thing happens with the Trisquel net install), using the following: linux (usb0)/install.386/vmlinuz initrd (usb0)/install.386/initrd.gz boot
As you can see, there is quite a lot of flicker and parts of the screen are missing or corrupt. I think this is related to the issue above ("error: no video mode activated").
The net install for Debian and Trisquel both work when using corebootfb initialization method, but they fail (as seen in the image) for text-mode method.
In case the attachment was scrubbed by the mailing list, I also put it here: http://dev.libreboot.org/x60txtmode.jpg
Trisquel graphical install works (I wasn't able to figure out how to boot the Debian graphical install).
I also enabled it for T60 (adding the keep/drop vesa fb option for t60/Kconfig, based on 6725, and cherry picking 5345) and the same behaviour was observed there.
What does work in text-mode init (tested): memtest86+ and grub invaders.
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Here is some further notes that I collected:
There are issues with i945 text mode graphics initialization: http://www.coreboot.org/pipermail/coreboot/2014-August/078468.html look into it, follow up on that post and try to fix it.
Trisquel isolinux menu doesn't show up in seabios (seavgabios) with text-mode, it just says 'Error setting up gfxboot', but it works in text-mode with the extract vbios. Looking at gma.c, it looks like this isn't setup in text-mode by native init, but obviously when using the extracted vbios, it is setting everything up properly? Debian/Trisquel net-install shows graphical corruption (see mailing list link) when booting directly from GRUB in text-mode, but works just fine when using the extracted vbios instead of seavgabios. Are these using text-mode or trying to use graphics? (graphical installers work just fine in native init or with extracted vbios) Debian net-installer (graphical one) fails (trisquel graphical installer is ok) in native graphics and text-mode (works fine in vesa/cbfb, or in text-mode plus extracted vbios): Scrolling/flickering text in a loop (segmentation fault): Xorg (xorg_backtrace+0x49) [0xb7*******] (numbers change) Xorg (0xb75******) [0xb7*******] (numbers change (vdso) (__kernel_rt_sigreturn+0x0) [0xb7******] (numbers change) /lib/libc.so.6 (cfree+0x49) [0xb7******] (numbers change) Xorg (xf86DeleteMode+0x51) [0xb7******] (numbers change) Segmentation fault at address 0xb7200000 Fatal server error: Caught signal 11 (Segmentation fault). Server aborting phcoder says that there are limitations in native graphic: for example, he says native init doesn't provide int10h at all, and that it lacks VBT. Are there other issues? He says that there are also lots of ACPI issues in general.
On 26/08/14 02:06, The Gluglug wrote:
The same issue does not occur when using coreboot with the vga rom extracted from factory bios.
On 25/08/14 16:50, The Gluglug wrote:
Using 6725 to enable text-mode gfx init on X60 when using native graphics initialization.
Affected machines: X60, T60. It may also affect: macbook21/macbook11, X60 Tablet
This relies on the (merged) patch 6723 that enables text-mode graphics initialization on i945 platforms. The code is there.
I then disabled "Keep VESA framebuffer" in menuconfig, to enable text-mode.
error: no video mode activated This is what I see when I try to use the net install iso for Debian with the isolinux parser in grub. I also saw the same thing when trying to start Trisquel 6 isolinux menu from SeaBIOS (with SeaVGABIOS added at vgaroms/vgabios.bin from seabios's rom that I built).
See attached image of what happens when I try to boot the net install from Debian (same thing happens with the Trisquel net install), using the following: linux (usb0)/install.386/vmlinuz initrd (usb0)/install.386/initrd.gz boot
As you can see, there is quite a lot of flicker and parts of the screen are missing or corrupt. I think this is related to the issue above ("error: no video mode activated").
The net install for Debian and Trisquel both work when using corebootfb initialization method, but they fail (as seen in the image) for text-mode method.
In case the attachment was scrubbed by the mailing list, I also put it here: http://dev.libreboot.org/x60txtmode.jpg
Trisquel graphical install works (I wasn't able to figure out how to boot the Debian graphical install).
I also enabled it for T60 (adding the keep/drop vesa fb option for t60/Kconfig, based on 6725, and cherry picking 5345) and the same behaviour was observed there.
What does work in text-mode init (tested): memtest86+ and grub invaders.
Just FYI, the native graphics work for the chromebooks works fine. But it was a long hard road to get there -- it basically took 18 months of hard off-again, on-again work.
Further, in our case, we set up the max res and bpp and use that. No modes. No text mode. No interrupts. We pass the details in the tables and the payload is expected to work it out. The kernel works it out by seeing that graphics hardware is initialized and using what it finds.
We had no desire to support text mode or int10 or any 1981-era services. Our goal was to provide a canvas in which depth charge and/or the X server could paint graphics.
So our use case is more limited than yours. I would argue that you should try to get around the need for text mode and INT10, but that's just me, since the goal of coreboot from the start was to get rid of INTxx; as wonderful as things like seabios are, they are not what we intended to have when we started the project.
In short, native graphics is nowhere near complete if your goal is a full text mode, INT10 supporting, standard PC world.
ron
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ron minnich -
The Gluglug