Restoring sc console look and feel with vt

[Adam Vande More]

On Tue, Sep 5, 2017 at 4:06 PM, Polytropon <freebsd at edvax.de> wrote:

> On Tue, 5 Sep 2017 22:52:37 +0200, Polytropon wrote:
> > On Tue, 5 Sep 2017 14:13:04 -0500, Adam Vande More wrote:
> > > On Tue, Sep 5, 2017 at 1:49 PM, Polytropon <freebsd at edvax.de> wrote:
> > >
> > > > I'll try to express better:
> > > >
> > > > When the system boots, the screen uses 80x25 characters. The
> > > > character size depends on the screen size of course. With sc,
> > > > I get "big letters" on a 21" CRT, as intended.
> > > >
> > > > When booting with vt, the system starts booting with the 80x25
> > > > mode, then switches to a font where I'd say the screen has
> > > > 160x100 characters (just a guess, I didn't count them actually).
> > > > Those are "small letters", even on a 21" CRT, too small for me
> > > > to be read conveniently.
> > > >
> > > > So what I need is a way to tell vt to display 80x25 characters
> > > > that "scale up", and generally make them look like the regular
> > > > sc text mode.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > For the former, removing the previous advice from loader.conf
> would be
> > > > the
> > > > > first step.  Then you should be able to find an acceptable setting
> > > > > experimenting with vidcontrol eg resolution/fonts.
> > > >
> > > > With vidcontrol, I only get error messages. I think it ie tied
> > > > to sc? I also have no idea what font names to try...
> > > >
> > >
> > >  Does your video hw requite kms?
> >
> > Which one doesn't? ;-)
> >
> >
> >
> > > If so, when is it loaded?  It should
> > > loaded from loader.conf, not later.
> >
> > Yes, I have those entries in /boot/loader.conf:
> >
> >       kern.vty=vt
> >       hw.vga.textmode=1
> >       i915kms_load="YES"
> >
> > The system has an on-board Intel GPU. The system boots with the
> > normal ("native") 80x25, then clears the screen upon kernel load,
> > continues for a short while in that mode, still 80x25, then lets
> > the screen flicker, and finally run at 133x52 (counted "manually")
> > which isn't sufficiently readable for me anymore. The mouse cursor
> > is even harder to spot...
> >
> > But as I said, without vt + KMS, X doesn't work anymore. We seem
> > to live in modern times. ;-)
> >
> >
> >
> > > You may need to explicitly define:
> > >
> > > hw.vga.textmode=0
> > >
> > > You can load fonts with:
> > >
> > > vidcontrol -f <font_name>
> > >
> > > Fonts should be located in:
> > >
> > > /usr/share/vt/fonts/
> >
> > Thanks for the pointer, I will try this now and report back about
> > the results.
>
> The results:
>
> With the configuration change, I can now select the fonts.
> While "gallant" seems to be the default font (no change if
> selected after system boots), the vgarom-* fonts are even
> worse. They seem to be made for ants. :-)
>
> I cannot get a "smaller" screen than 132x54 (now verified).
> I don't care if the letters aren't "pixel-perfect", but they
> need to be bigger. Is there an option to tell the system
> to "scale up" the font (so only 80x25 will fit)?
>
> The normal 80x25 text mode is something I'm really going
> to miss, and the change sc -> vt is causing me pain. In my
> eyes. I'd like to change everything back to sc, but that
> doesn't seem to be a possible way (causes X to stop working).
> And I haven't started yet to complain that I cannot use
> german ö ä ü Ö Ä Ü and ß anymore...
>
> Any further ideas what to try?
>

What does this output:

vidcontrol -i mode

You can drop in your own font perhaps with huge letters.  There are some
instruction on the FreeBSD newcons wiki, but I've never tried them.

You could also try lowering the resolution:

kern.vt.fb.default_mode="640x480"

There is also the option of using the accelerated VESA mode:

https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/46723/

That would allow you to continue to use sc, but may also sacrifice so video
flexibility.

-- 
Adam