URL: <http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?34464>
Summary: gfxmenu: A blank screen with a gfxmenu theme. Project: GNU GRUB Submitted by: towheedm Submitted on: Mon 03 Oct 2011 12:21:09 AM GMT Category: User Interface Severity: Major Priority: 5 - Normal Item Group: Software Error Status: None Privacy: Public Assigned to: None Originator Name: towheedm Originator Email: towhe...@yahoo.com Open/Closed: Open Discussion Lock: Any Release: Release: other Reproducibility: Every Time Planned Release: None _______________________________________________________ Details: I am using a very basic theme using the gfxmenu theming engine. The theme only sets a background image and displays the menu items using a DejaVu .pf2 font created using the grub-mkfont utility. This was tested on Ubuntu Natty using grub version 1.99~rc1-13ubuntu3. What should happen: The theme should be displayed allowing me to select a menu item to boot. What happens: A blank screen is shown and the keyboard stops responding (using a Logitech MX300 wireless keyboard). What I did to rectify it: After several hours of testing, I found that the problem was two fold: 1. The first involves GRUB setting the default GFXMODE. In previous versions of GRUB2, if GRUB_GFXMODE was commented out in /etc/default/grub, it was automatically set to 640x480 in 10_linux. However, this behavior has changed and if the line is commented out, GRUB now sets it to 'auto'. I would assume, it would iterate through the list of valid vbe modes and select the first working mode. Unfortunately for me, it selects 640x400x256, which works in text mode, but causes a black screen and a hung keyboard with gfxmenu. A quick fix was to uncomment the GRUB_GFXMODE variable. 2. The second involves assigning each menu entry to a class. If the class parameter is not specified for ANY menu entries, the theme does not load and a blank screen is produced. This was fixed in 10_linux by changing this line: echo "submenu \"Previous Linux versions\" {" to: echo "submenu \"Previous Linux versions\" --class menuitem {" The menu entry for memtest86+ must also be assigned to a class by changing the menuentry line: menuentry "Memory test (memtest86+)" { to: menuentry "Memory test (memtest86+)" --class memtest { After using the above fixes the theme displays properly. My video card is an nvidia GeForce FX5200. This problem was also present for another user with an nvidia Quadro FX 1500M. Please note that for some reason, this problem results in a hung keyboard. _______________________________________________________ Reply to this item at: <http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?34464> _______________________________________________ Message sent via/by Savannah http://savannah.gnu.org/ _______________________________________________ Bug-grub mailing list Bug-grub@gnu.org https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-grub