Solved drm-kmod: Black screen and freeze after update from FreeBSD 12.1 to 12.2

I have also just been hit by the DRM oddity, however for a different reason. When 12.1 was released back in 2019 there was an issue with drm-kmod:
https://www.freebsd.org/releases/12.1R/errata/
[2019-11-04] A late issue was discovered where systems using the graphics/drm-kmod port built on FreeBSD 12.0-RELEASE will crash during boot. It is advised to remove the port prior to upgrading, and build the port instead of using the upstream binary package.
I had to manually compile drm-kmod that time. After I did so I ran pkg lock drm-fbsd12.0-kmod-4.16.g20191120 to stop the custom file being overwritten.
I updated to 12.2 today and rebooted, but after the initial scrambled screen that I am used to due to glitches with the AMD graphics driver the screen failed to recover. I think FreeBSD was still working on the scrambled screen, eg I could have logged in and entered commands, but didn't really test it. I had made a dd copy of my primary SSD with 12.1 on it right before the upgrade. After some messing around I discovered the problem from my old notes that I'd made when I did the 12.1 upgrade and copied my 12.1 image back to the SSD. After running pkg unlock drm-fbsd12.0-kmod the package appeared in my upgrade list.
Code:
root@f121l:~ # pkg unlock drm-fbsd12.0-kmod
drm-fbsd12.0-kmod-4.16.g20191120: unlock this package? [y/N]: y
Unlocking drm-fbsd12.0-kmod-4.16.g20191120
root@f121l:~ # pkg upgrade
Updating FreeBSD repository catalogue...
FreeBSD repository is up to date.
All repositories are up to date.
Checking for upgrades (20 candidates): 100%
Processing candidates (20 candidates): 100%
The following 18 package(s) will be affected (of 0 checked):

Installed packages to be UPGRADED:
---
        drm-fbsd12.0-kmod: 4.16.g20191120 -> 4.16.g20201016_1
---
Upgraded the old drm-fbsd12.0-kmod, updated the system to 12.2 and there was no problem. Removing "hw.syscons.disable=1" (which is a workaround for a glitch with UEFI and AMD GPUs) from /boot/loader.conf was all I needed to do to get a console output while I was debugging.
 
Upgraded the old drm-fbsd12.0-kmod, updated the system to 12.2 and there was no problem. Removing "hw.syscons.disable=1" (which is a workaround for a glitch with UEFI and AMD GPUs) from /boot/loader.conf was all I needed to do to get a console output while I was debugging.
And for that there is no need to modify this in /boot/loader.conf, but boot can be interrupted and this value can be manually set to 0 when needed temporarily. No big problem :)
 
Back
Top