[mythtv-users] New Mythbuntu 14.04 battle with nvidia boot up

[faginbagin]

On 10/16/2014 3:24 PM, Craig Huff wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 9, 2014 at 3:42 PM, Kingsley Turner <krt at krt.com.au> wrote:
>> I'm just guessing here (I had to back-port to 12.04 after 14.04 failed on my
>> nvidia 9400)
>> But I would try completely disabling any sort of framebuffer / GUI boot
>> splash.
>>
>> I notice that 14.04 has framebuffer GUI splash/logo stuff, and 12.04 does
>> not, it's pure text.
>>
>> Even with just the install CD/DVD I got some screen corruption just before
>> the framebuffer GUI started.
>> (With both Mythbuntu 12.04.04, and 14.04.01)
>> So .. have you tried FRAMEBUFFER="n"  (or whatever it takes to turn this
>> sucker off).
>>
>> cheers,
>> -kt
> 
> 
> Been beating on this problem and I've not made any progress.
> 
> I tried using FRAMEBUFFER=n, but that didn't seem to do anything.
> 
> I have tried searching for pointers in webpages on grub configuration
> that might help and googled "linux nvidia boot freeze", but none of
> the following suggested actions helped (not necessarily tried in this
> order):
>      1) twiddle with vmalloc=nnn[KMG]B (instead of default 128MB) in
> linux boot command line (or if it had worked in /etc/default/grub as
> an addition to the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash" line.
>      2) twiddle with the screen resolution in /etc/default/grub with
> various values for parameters GRUB_GFXMODE=nnnxmmm, and
> GRUB_GFXPAYLOAD_LINUX=nnnxmmm, including 640x480, 1280x1024.
>      3) remove nouveau driver
>      4) remove nvidia driver, reboot, reinstall nvidia driver (nvidia-304).
> 
> The only thing I can say for sure is that given these lines from
> /boot/grub/grub.cfg:
> 
>      ### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###
>      function gfxmode {
>          set gfxpayload="${1}"
>          if [ "${1}" = "keep" ]; then
>              set vt_handoff=vt.handoff=7
>          else
>              set vt_handoff=
>          fi
>      }
>     set linux_gfx_mode=1280x1024
>     export linux_gfx_mode
> 
> then these lines (which follow immediately after the above) always
> results in the system freezing on cold boot before anything gets
> logged in /var/log/<anything>:
> 
>      menuentry 'Ubuntu' --class ubuntu --class gnu-linux --class gnu
> --class os $menuentry_id_option
> 'gnulinux-simple-f559581d-fb44-482a-8751-ce00ea705bd6' {
>              recordfail
>              load_video
>              gfxmode $linux_gfx_mode
>              insmod gzio
>              insmod part_msdos
>              insmod ext2
>              set root='hd0,msdos1'
>              if [ x$feature_platform_search_hint = xy ]; then
>                search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root
> --hint-bios=hd0,msdos1 --hint-efi=hd0,msdos1
> --hint-baremetal=ahci0,msdos1  f559581d-fb44-482a-8751-ce00ea705bd6
>              else
>                search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root
> f559581d-fb44-482a-8751-ce00ea705bd6
>              fi
>              linux   /boot/vmlinuz-3.13.0-37-generic
> root=UUID=f559581d-fb44-482a-8751-ce00ea705bd6 ro  quiet splash
> $vt_handoff
>              initrd  /boot/initrd.img-3.13.0-37-generic
> }
> 
> and choosing the following menu entry will always succeed (with manual
> intervention to hit return a couple of times in the boot process):
> 
>      menuentry 'Ubuntu, with Linux 3.13.0-37-generic (recovery mode)'
> --class ubuntu --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os
> $menuentry_id_option
> 'gnulinux-3.13.0-37-generic-recovery-f559581d-fb44-482a-8751-ce00ea705bd6'
> {
>              recordfail
>              load_video
>              insmod gzio
>              insmod part_msdos
>              insmod ext2
>              set root='hd0,msdos1'
>              if [ x$feature_platform_search_hint = xy ]; then
>                  search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root
> --hint-bios=hd0,msdos1 --hint-efi=hd0,msdos1
> --hint-baremetal=ahci0,msdos1  f559581d-fb44-482a-8751-ce00ea705bd6
>              else
>                  search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root
> f559581d-fb44-482a-8751-ce00ea705bd6
>              fi
>              echo    'Loading Linux 3.13.0-37-generic ...'
>              linux   /boot/vmlinuz-3.13.0-37-generic
> root=UUID=f559581d-fb44-482a-8751-ce00ea705bd6 ro recovery nomodeset
>              echo    'Loading initial ramdisk ...'
>              initrd  /boot/initrd.img-3.13.0-37-generic
> }
> 
> I'd hate to spend money on a new video card just to find out that
> didn't fix the problem, but I'm about out of other ideas to try.
> Seems like there ought to be a way to get this system to run with a
> newer version of Mythbuntu since it works perfectly (albeit with
> outdated features and security) on the old version (Mythbuntu 10.04
> with _no_ updates to kernel or MythTV).
> 
> Any more suggestions I can try?
> 
> --
> Craig.

Forgot to add that more info about configuring grub can be found here:
https://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/html_node/Simple-configuration.html

Helen