Re: No console anymore. How to figure this out.

On 3/15/26 10:49 AM, Alan Mackenzie wrote:
>> I can't go back to a previous version of nvidia since it is out of the
>> tree now.  I did keyword a newer version to see if it had been fixed
>> tho.  Still the same.  No console.
> That's strange.  In my gentoo repository, I have these ebuilds for
> nvidia-drivers:
>
> MAC ~ # ls -lrt /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-*.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 16826 Nov 22 08:41 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-470.256.02-r2.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 15261 Nov 22 08:41 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-390.157.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 20856 Feb  3 13:17 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-570.211.01.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 20413 Feb  3 13:17 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-535.288.01.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 21260 Feb 18 05:40 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-590.48.01-r1.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 20954 Feb 18 05:40 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-580.94.18.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 21419 Feb 28 08:16 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-580.126.18.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 20923 Mar 11 01:08 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-580.142.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 20326 Mar 12 01:38 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-595.45.04.ebuild
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 20283 Mar 14 00:08 /var/db/repos/gentoo/x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers/nvidia-drivers-595.44.03.ebuild
>
> Have you said yet which version of nvidia-drivers you are using at the
> moment?  It looks like some of them have been updated very recently
> indeed, in the last three or four days.  Presumably you can only use one
> of the version numbers (first three digits), say 590.*.*.
> 590.48.01-r1.ebuild is from February 18.  That would match your "about
> two weeks" of not working.

This is my list for what works with my card.


root@Gentoo-1 / # equery list -p nvidia-drivers
[-P-] [  ] x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers-580.126.18:0/580
[IP-] [  ] x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers-580.142:0/580
root@Gentoo-1 / #

I was using the 126 version.  The 142 was keyworded I guess because it 
is new and not marked stable yet.  I still need to reboot for the new 
nvidia drivers.  I been killing bugs.  Those carpenter bees are trying 
to eat my sis-n-law and my place.  I think they going to be made at me 
now tho.  LOL


>> When I rebooted, the usual text was scrolling up until the display
>> manager started.  That worked normally.  I also did something else. When
>> I upgraded the nvidia drivers, I tried again to go to a console.  Blank
>> screen.  I typed in root and then my password as if I was logging in.  I
>> then typed in reboot.  A few seconds later the computer beeped the usual
>> booting beep and up comes the BIOS screen.  So, agetty is running and it
>> is working, this seems to be purely a display problem.  This may be yet
>> another clue.  I dunno.
> Yes, that is bound to be useful to know.  It would seem that the boot
> messages are using some initial framebuffer, possibly taken over from
> grub, and nvidia-drivers is trying to initialise its own framebuffer, but
> failing and leaving the framebuffer in an unusable state.
>
> I did a quick web search for this problem, with search string "Linux
> nvidia driver no console" and two of the more useful results were:
>
> https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-p-8864997.html?sid=8f5f82f5b20d94e7ff69519d9e5ae1af
> "No console output on boot with nvidia-drivers"
> https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-p-8864997.html?sid=8f5f82f5b20d94e7ff69519d9e5ae1af
> "New nvidia GPU, no console anymore", though the OP is using nouveau,
> here.
>
> I think these mentioned needing to disable some of the kernel flags like
> CONFIG_DRM_... and CONFIG_FB_...  Might it be you've got a CONFIG_...
> option wrongly set, and that didn't matter for the previous version of
> the driver, but does now?

Both links are the same URL.  I read the one.  I changed the settings to 
match what the dev posted.  I had some set correctly already but changed 
a couple.  We'll see.  I may change the other settings below as well 
then build and reboot if you think it will help.

I did a search and I think this is the ones you are talking about. They 
are enabled.  Sorry about the wrapping.


Symbol: DRM [=y]
   │ Type  : tristate
   │ Defined at drivers/gpu/drm/Kconfig:8
   │   Prompt: Direct Rendering Manager (XFree86 4.1.0 and higher DRI 
support)
   │   Depends on: HAS_IOMEM [=y] && (AGP [=y] || AGP [=y]=n [=n]) && 
!EMULATED_CMPXCHG && HAS_DMA [=y]
   │   Location:
   │     -> Device Drivers
   │       -> Graphics support
   │ (1)     -> Direct Rendering Manager (XFree86 4.1.0 and higher DRI 
support) (DRM [=y])
   │ Selects: DRM_PANEL_ORIENTATION_QUIRKS [=y] && DRM_KMS_HELPER [=y] 
&& FB_CORE [=y] && FB_SYSMEM_HELPERS_DEFERRED [=y] && HDMI [=y] && I2C 
[=y] && DMA_SHARED_BUFFER [=y] && SYNC_FILE [=y] && KCMP [=y]  │


   │ Symbol: FB [=y]
   │ Type  : tristate
   │ Defined at drivers/video/fbdev/Kconfig:6
   │   Prompt: Support for frame buffer device drivers
   │   Depends on: HAS_IOMEM [=y]
   │   Location:
   │     -> Device Drivers
   │       -> Graphics support
   │         -> Frame buffer Devices
   │ (1)       -> Support for frame buffer device drivers (FB [=y])
   │ Selects: FB_CORE [=y] && FB_NOTIFY [=y]



Do you think I should disable those and rebuild a kernel for it?  I 
could try it.  It either works or it doesn't.  LOL


>
>>>> Oh, would I need to reboot for the code to take effect once I go back a
>>>> version of something?
>>> I think that's likely.  🙁
>>>> Dale
>>>> 🙂  🙂
>> Do you think it would help to regenerate the grub info for the kernel
>> and init images and reinstall grub on the boot up thingy? Could
>> something have maybe changed and something is not being seen/loaded now,
>> that amd thingy in /boot for example???
> It would not be the first thing I would try.  But maybe there is a kernel
> parameter which is missing/superfluous, that worked before but doesn't
> work now.
>

Well, I already did it now.  ROFL  I figure what the heck.


>> I'm grasping at straws here.  Trying to share info that may be a clue to
>> think on.  I'm kinda clueless.  Given I can blindly login, I know
>> everything but the display is working.  I also know it works when
>> booting up as well as all the kernel loading a services are displayed.
>> Once it switches to GUI tho, no more console.
>> This info help any?  It give you a clue as to where we can look? I'm
>> going to do like I usually do after a grub update and regenerate that.
>> See if that helps any.  Dang it takes me a while to get back up and
>> running tho.  Several of my drive sets are encrypted.  The little
>> scripts I wrote, with some help from this list, do help speed that up.  😉
>> Thanks for the help.  I'm open to ideas.
> There might be relevant tips on the Gentoo wiki in
>
> https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/NVIDIA/nvidia-drivers
>
> , but that's quite a long detailed page.
>
>> Dale
>> 🙂  🙂


Just some additional info.  I did rebuild the nvidia drivers.  It was in 
the preserved-rebuild list.  That might do something, might not.  I'll 
likely try rebooting with current kernel.  If the console is still 
missing, try the other kernel config if you think it might work.

I gotta try something.  Right now, I'm watching snow videos.  o_O  I 
need some popcorn.

Dale

:-)  :-)