Re: Userconf & DRM driver (Was Re: Panic: no console device)

[Michael van Elst <mlelstv%serpens.de@localhost>]

On Thu, Mar 07, 2019 at 02:53:58PM -0500, Bob Bernstein wrote:
> Hi Michael. I have taken the liberty of ressurecting this post in 
> order to get a tad more help with its suggestion. I hope I haven't 
> violated any list etiquette in the process.
> 
> On Mon, Feb 25, 2019 at 12:34:25PM -0000, Michael van Elst wrote:
> 
> > It's probably trying to use a graphics card that isn't supported.
> > In that case you could try to intercept the bootloader to get a
> > prompt and 'boot netbsd -c'. This will start in userconf mode where,
> > assuming the keyboard works, you can disable the DRM driver for
> > your graphics card. When you quit userconf mode, it will then
> > fall back to use the plain VGA driver.
> 
> How can I identify the specific driver in question? Perhaps userconf 
> itself has a way of doing this? Is there some hallmark token for 
> which I should search dmest?

The drivers are (for Intel, ATI and NVidia):

i915drmkms
radeon
nouveau

You can enter the commands interactively or put them into /boot.cfg as

userconf=disable i915drmkms
userconf=disable radeon
userconf=disable neouveau

or create individual boot menu entries like this to chose how to boot:

menu=Boot normally:rndseed /var/db/entropy-file;boot netbsd
menu=Boot with VGA:rndseed /var/db/entropy-file;userconf disable nouveau;boot netbsd


Greetings,
-- 
                                Michael van Elst
Internet: mlelstv%serpens.de@localhost
                                "A potential Snark may lurk in every tree."