[mythtv-users] Trouble booting a system with S-video plugged in

[Larry Taub]

The machine does in fact seem to be hanging. In the IRC channel, I was 
advised to look for a framebuffer in the kernel but could not find one. I am 
using a 16k stack kernel provided by linuxant because my next task is to set 
up wireless pci. 
 If I boot with VGA only connected, it goes in fine and I can startx and 
have it go to whichever display I configure in xorg.conf. I can plug in 
S-video once it is finished booting and has a login prompt and use that 
display for X if I desire.
 If I have only S-video connected, it hangs though I still have keyboard 
responsiveness in that the lights will turn on + off and I can get a 
response out of control alt del. I cannot access the machine remotely 
either. It displays the BIOS information. It checks for boot devices then 
informs me it is switching to GRUB level 2 and then I get a black screen 
with a signal. The hard drive light remains on for a few seconds then shuts 
off and doesn't come back on. It leads me to believe it is hanging at this 
point. If I plug in the VGA at this point, I get no display. 
 If I boot with VGA + S-video both connected, it goes in fine and I can 
startx and have it go to whichever display I configure in xorg.conf.
 If I have nothing connected, it boots fine and I can access it remotely. 
However, plugging in either VGA or S-video cable yields me no signal.
 So, in summary, I have a decent workaround to get my S-Video working: I 
need to have a VGA cord connected to boot the computer then I can remove the 
VGA cord once X is loaded and hope to not need to reboot again. If I exit 
out of X at this point, the TV display seems to be not synced but it does 
show what is on the command line scrolling horizontally on the screen at a 
rapid pace. 
 Unfortunately, I see no option to configure my video card in the BIOS 
because it is a separate card.
 Thanks for any suggestions.
 On 6/12/05, Nick <knowledgejunkie at gmail.com> wrote: 
> 
> On 6/12/05, Larry Taub <larryt at gmail.com> wrote:
> > When I boot with S-Video plugged in, the BIOS shows up fine and the tv
> > displays that the grub bootloader stage 2 is beginning and then it never
> > continues. If I plug in a VGA monitor or nothing, it boots fine and when 
> it
> > gets to the X login screen, I can hook in my S-Video cable and see
> > everything just fine and it works fine on the tv after this point.
> 
> When you only have S-Video plugged in, is the machine actually
> hanging, or is there just no output on the TV? Depending on X, it may
> be looking for a VGA monitor to be present to successfully launch the
> X server. If this is the case, it is usually possible to edit the
> xorg.conf file to tell X that you are using on S-Video output.
> Alternatively, if you are using a clone mode, then it is likely it
> will try and detect the presence of the VGA card first (which may
> explain why it works and you get cloned displays with both VGA and
> S-Video connected)
> 
> >
> > Obviously, I don't intend on rebooting this machine often but it would 
> be
> > nice to figure out what is causing this problem and perhaps fix it
> > especially since my backend/frontend machine boots fine with just the
> > S-Video cable (on the same TV and S-Video cable right now).
> 
> On my Pundit-R (ATI based) machine, I use only S-Video output
> connected to the TV. I changed the BIOS to reflect this, and also
> edited my xorg.conf file to tell it I am using only display via
> S-Video.
> 
> HTH,
> Nick
>
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