making ctrl alt f1-f5 console work in kubuntu 8.10

[ioaniro]

Hello all,

Hardware:

15" (1680x1050 native res) laptop with intel core 2 duo 2.53 4Gb ram nvidia 9800m GTS etc

Current setup kubuntu 8.10, nvidia driver 180.18 (beta but I just installed it to see if it will solve my problem tried most fixes with the 177.82). Everything works fine except th powermizer keeping the card in the lowest performance states but that's another story I think.

Problem:

What I would like to have is get access to the full screen console by ctrl-alt-f1-f5. So far what happens is if I press whichever of ctrl-alt-f1-5 it takes me to a black screen (I think actually the monitor turns off).
I tried to play around in /etc/initramfs-tools/modules and /etc/modprobe.b/blacklist-framebuffer to try to get vesafb, nvidiafb and whatnot to load but nothing gives me a console.
What is strange is that when I get the computer to boot up I can ctrl-alt-f1-5 without problems, I even set up the resolution of the console to 1680x1050 and works perfectly. The moment xserver starts (where the nvidia logo splash screen appears if I dont put nologo true option) is the moment the ctrl-alt-f1-5 stops working and starts taking me to a black screen. Is still a functional console I can blindly put in commands and log but.... nothing visible.

Any ideas?

Thanks all, great distro with the 8.10

[Zorael]

Re: making ctrl alt f1-f5 console work in kubuntu 8.10

Hmm. Have you tried explicitly defining a video mode in your grub kernel entry? Just add vga=ask to the kernel line. I'm not at all sure that'll do the trick, but hey.

kernel		/boot/vmlinuz-blahblah-generic root=randomlocationwoo ro quiet splash vga=ask

Reboot, and when asked, pick a down-to-earth video mode. Like the very first one.

[ioaniro]

Re: making ctrl alt f1-f5 console work in kubuntu 8.10

Didn't do more than the usual. I tried to pick few down to earth resolutions in several reboots and all result in the same thing. I can see the splash when booting (or the text of loading and stuff if i put nosplash) but once the xserver starts and I get to the log in screen ctrl-alt-f1-5 dros me in a black screen.

[ioaniro]

Re: making ctrl alt f1-f5 console work in kubuntu 8.10

ok, I might have an update on the matter even though I have no idea what to make of it. I was looking around the /var/log/daemon.log and I can see something like this:

Dec 25 12:40:21 ioan-Nexus init: tty4 main process (4622) killed by TERM signal
Dec 25 12:40:21 ioan-Nexus init: tty5 main process (4623) killed by TERM signal
Dec 25 12:40:21 ioan-Nexus init: tty2 main process (4630) killed by TERM signal
Dec 25 12:40:21 ioan-Nexus init: tty3 main process (4631) killed by TERM signal
Dec 25 12:40:21 ioan-Nexus init: tty6 main process (4632) killed by TERM signal
Dec 25 12:40:21 ioan-Nexus init: tty1 main process (5751) killed by TERM signal

Now, keeping in mind that I'm more or less new to linux and all this so I don't really know who logs what and where (I was just looking through all the logs to make some sense of it) it looks to me that someone kills my consoles when the GUI starts... Any idea of how to see who's doing this evil deed?

Marry Christmas!