Pause in tty switching

rhish · Mar 12, 2014

I recently installed fresh install of FreeBSD 10-Release.
Sync'd up /usr/src
then went through building world, kernel, etc.

And now, for some reason, theres a 1 second pause whenever I switch tty's.
Like when I use alt+f1, f2, etc, to switch tty's.

Its very noticeable and annoying. Its amazing how frustrating the delay is.
Usually switching tty's with alt+f2 is instantaneous.

I cant figure what would be effecting it. This is fresh install, sync source, build world process, reboot... weird delay.

I tried changing vidcontrol MODE, to see if a different mode would get rid of it, but its still there.

Im gonna just wipe and start over, I cant imagine what could possibly be effecting this.
This same workstation has had FreeBSD on it before without the weird delay. Also, it did not have it when I first installed using 10-Release.

It just showed up with initial build world for 10-Stable.

Has anyone experienced this, have any idea where I could start looking?

rhish · Mar 12, 2014

Additionally,

I just booted into LiveCD off the install USB device...

The 1second pause is gone.

So, I know its not a hardware issue. Using LiveCD gets rid of the weird delay.

rhish · Mar 12, 2014

I also noticed theres a new file in the kernel config directory

/usr/src/sys/amd64/conf/VT

Is this somethign new? Nothing about it in UPDATING?

It removes and adds some devices, for whatever VT is??

Code:

nodevice   sc
nodevice   vga
device      vt
device      vt_vga

trh411 · Mar 12, 2014

rhish said:
I also noticed theres a new file in the kernel config directory

/usr/src/sys/amd64/conf/VT

Is this somethign new? Nothing about it in UPDATING?

It removes and adds some devices, for whatever VT is??

Code:

nodevice sc nodevice vga device vt device vt_vga

It is the newcons(4) new console driver device, the replacement for syscons(4). See here for details: New Console Driver. It's not supposed to be the default, even for FreeBSD-11.0-CURRENT. You can go back to syscons(4) by building a new kernel with sc and vga enabled instead of vt and vt_vga.

wblock@ · Mar 12, 2014

Please see https://wiki.freebsd.org/Newcons.

In the old days, there was a noticeable lag when switching from console to X that could be reduced by having moused_enable="YES". I still don't know why that reduced the lag. Also don't know whether that will make any difference now with vt(9) and KMS.

Reinstalling is usually just wasted effort. It also resets everything, and sets back debugging.

rhish · Mar 12, 2014

Great, thanks for the heads up. Wonder why theres no notice in UPDATING?

If I build a new custom kernel, while the VT include file is still in /usr/src/sys/amd64/conf it shouldnt pull in those changes unless I specifically build VT as my kernel right? VT is just a mask over GENERIC right?

I wonder if something has changed in Stable recently, and I just built without VT, when it was expecting me to pull in VT changes?
Another workstation here, without recently updated /use/src doesnt have the VT file in kernel config directory.

Im not sure if im experiencing the new delay because im using newcons, or because i'm not using newcons.

In any case, gonna try building both ways and see which has instantaneous switch. Its amazing how much that small delay just wrecks my soul...

trh411 · Mar 12, 2014

trh411 said:
rhish said:

I also noticed theres a new file in the kernel config directory

/usr/src/sys/amd64/conf/VT

Is this somethign new? Nothing about it in UPDATING?

It removes and adds some devices, for whatever VT is??

Code:

nodevice sc nodevice vga device vt device vt_vga

Click to expand...

It is the newcons(4) new console driver device, the replacement for syscons(4). See here for details: New Console Driver. It's not supposed to be the default, even for FreeBSD-11.0-CURRENT. You can go back to syscons(4) by building a new kernel with sc and vga enabled instead of vt and vt_vga.

Just to clarify, building a GENERIC kernel does not pull in the VT file, so you should still be using syscons(4). I'm guesing the VT file is provided for convenience for those who want to build a kernel with newcons(4) support.

rhish · Mar 12, 2014

Right, that's what I was thinking. So, if I didn't specifically build KERNCONF=VT then it didnt make those changes before building my kernel. And so I should still be using sc and vga.

Something not adding up...

I'll figure it out.

Thanks for the info.

trh411 · Mar 12, 2014

rhish said:
Right, that's what I was thinking. So, if I didn't specifically build KERNCONF=VT then it didnt make those changes before building my kernel. And so I should still be using sc and vga.

That is correct.