Re: console resolution
On 2010-01-22 at 09:00:54 -0500, Javier Barroso wrote:
> Seem like gfxpayload is the substitute, but now I can't find where is the
> doc (it doesn't appear in kernel-parameters.txt).
The "vga" kernel option is a strange option. It's really more of
a bootloader option than a kernel option. The bootloader itself has to have
support for it. The actual change of video mode is done by means of a
video BIOS call. This is an old-fashioned DOS-style interrupt call,
which must be done in real mode. I believe the bootloader itself makes the call,
while it is still running in real mode. The bootloader switches to protected
mode prior to passing control to the kernel. Somehow, the kernel is told
what the video mode is, so that it can allocate the proper amount of memory
for a virtual terminal buffer, but I don't believe that the kernel itself
actually makes the video BIOS call. That's the way it worked under lilo and grub1
anyway. This is for text-mode virtual consoles.
I'm really going out on a limb when I talk about grub2, since I only used
it for a very short time, but I seem to remember that gfxpayload sets the
video mode for grub itself. I don't think it applies to the kernel proper.
The doc for grub2, such as it is, is at
http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/grub-2.en.html. I gave up on grub2
rather quickly and went back to lilo when I couldn't get the vga option
to work; so I know very little about it.
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