# vmwgfx problem: fbsplash resets / goes away when loading mod

## DNAspark99

Followed the splashutils docs: http://en.gentoo-wiki.com/wiki/Fbsplash

Got it setup. Built initramfs, reboot. Splash theme IS displayed nicely - for the first few seconds. Then it suddenly 'resets', loses the graphics, or otherwise goes blank, ...roughly around the time udev starts up.

Once the system is booted up, I can log in, and re-set the console theme with splash_manager, and it comes back and stays there - until the next reboot. 

Any idea what I'm missing?

cat /etc/conf.d/splash | grep -v ^# | grep -v ^$

```

SPLASH_VERBOSE_ON_ERRORS="yes"

SPLASH_EFFECTS="fadein,fadeout"

SPLASH_TEXTBOX="no"

SPLASH_AUTOVERBOSE="0"

SPLASH_THEME="gentoo"

```

Last edited by DNAspark99 on Fri Feb 22, 2013 7:38 am; edited 2 times in total

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## BradN

Maybe it's theme related, it seems with the theme I'm using, there are two separate splashes displayed - one from the initrd during early boot, and another image that comes up once the video hardware is initialized (before this I'm using UEFI framebuffer).  Is it possible your theme is missing the resolution that it switches to?

You could try the theme preview command (Sorry I'm not at that machine so I can't easily look it up) and see if the theme you're using can display at the resolution your console uses once done booting.

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## DNAspark99

 *BradN wrote:*   

> Maybe it's theme related, it seems with the theme I'm using, there are two separate splashes displayed - one from the initrd during early boot, and another image that comes up once the video hardware is initialized (before this I'm using UEFI framebuffer).  Is it possible your theme is missing the resolution that it switches to?
> 
> You could try the theme preview command (Sorry I'm not at that machine so I can't easily look it up) and see if the theme you're using can display at the resolution your console uses once done booting.

 

Yes, it does display at the resolution I'm using. Both initially, during boot - from the initramfs image - then it goes away - then after login I can manually re-set the theme with splash_manager. The FB resolution appears to remains the same (0x317) throughout, from initial bootup to final login.

I've now tried with some of the other themes, and for example, the defualt 'gentoo' theme, which has a very light color-scheme, illustrates that it appears to tbe the non-text areas at the top & bottom that 'go away' - the main 'text' portion of the console actually has part of the theme still displayed.

Ex, see:

http://imgur.com/GjNgK5e - note the black bands at the top & bottom.

I can of course remedy this after bootup with:

splash_manager -c set --theme=gentoo --tty=1

..and could set that in a local.d startup script - but I'd rather have it display properly throughout. (as it does on my other systems).

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## DNAspark99

Ok, it has something to do with what udev is doing. (sys-fs/udev-197-r8 ). Likely while repopulating /dev from a tarball - and either wiping out or resetting the fbconsole in the process.

by commenting out the following line in the /etc/init.d/udev script, in the populate_dev() function, the line:

```

udevadm trigger --type=devices --action add

```

after commenting out, the fbconsole theme persists solidly throughout the boot sequence. YAY! however this causes several other problems...

The code seems to imply booting with 'nocoldplug' may help avoid this - however adding it to my kernel options and rebooting, no change. 

I'm looking for this '/dev' tarball (or whatever it's using to populate /dev), though no luck yet. Can anyone point me in the right direction?Last edited by DNAspark99 on Fri Feb 22, 2013 7:41 am; edited 2 times in total

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## DNAspark99

Correction. It's not directly udev's fault, but it pointed me in the right direction  :Smile: 

The problem was udev autoloading the vmwgfx module. (this gentoo is installed via VMware Fusion) It turns out, when this module is reloaded, it resets/blanks all but the active line in the tty. 

Blacklisting this module in /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf prevents the fbconsole reset issue - which is fine for now, but it would be nice to resolve directly...

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## billydv

but doesn't blacklisting the module prevent 3d hardware acceleration? we need the module when x starts, don't we?

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## DNAspark99

 *billydv wrote:*   

> but doesn't blacklisting the module prevent 3d hardware acceleration? we need the module when x starts, don't we?

 

Indeed. However in my case these systems do not need a desktop environment.

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## BradN

Then... why do they need a splash screen?

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## DNAspark99

Heh, yes, I can see how that would seem a bit odd. 

Long story short, my company uses gentoo through VMware on developer workstations. These installs have a custom fbsplash theme, basically just to brand it with the gentoo logo, and make it look 'somewhat professional'.

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## billydv

What I have done to workaround is rebuild my kernel with agp and vmware video driver built into kernel and vesafb not built at all, neither as a module nor built in. I also set use vmware video framebuffer by default. For grub I removed all video=vesafb stuff and I have a working framebuffer splash with f2 working to switch between silent and verbose. One caveat, the verbose does not show the fbsplash image but I can live with that.

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