Setting console font via /etc/vconsole.conf doesn't has no effect, my virtual console fonts are still super tiny

English Applications
1

I’m trying to tackle issue with super tiny fonts in my virtual console (tty1, Ctrl+Alt+F1).
I’ve read and liked post: Text mode console font size - #6 by dcurtisfra and followed advice there.

I have installed terminus-bitmap-fonts as recommended.

When I set the font explicitly, via setfont command, in the virtual console, it works.
$ setfont ter-v32b
Larger font is instantly applied and the text is finally readable.
So far so good.

But I want to make this large font permanent.

So I edited /etc/vconsole.conf, as recommended.
Replaced default font eurlatgr.psfu with ter-v32b.

dell-xps-3:/home/espinosa # cat /etc/vconsole.conf
KEYMAP=gb
FONT=ter-v32b
FONT_MAP=
FONT_UNIMAP=
XKBLAYOUT=gb
XKBMODEL=microsoftpro
XKBOPTIONS=terminate:ctrl_alt_bksp

I changed only the FONT line. Rest was already there.

But after system restart - the font was not applied. Nothing has changed. I’m still stuck with super tiny fonts in the virtual console.

2

Do you use Plymouth?

3

According to journalctl -xb yes, I do:

Sep 03 19:09:05 dell-xps-3 systemd[1]: Starting Show Plymouth Boot Screen...

I haven’t changed anything. It’s whatever is default in current openSuse Slowroll.

Also, I was not able to set resolution through Grub Linux boot parameter video=1600x900. I suspect, it’s related.

Also I have in Grub parameters nosimplefb=1, if it is also related. Not sure what is that for. Apparently something related to Nvidia cards, which I have.

4

It conflicts with console settings. I do not know any solution. The most simple workaround is to load font in ~/.profile on tty.

5

OK. Good to know.

Is there a way how to at least decrease display resolution when using Plymouth?
So that the text will be at least legible.

6

Plymouth is using whatever resolution kernel is using which should be what is set in video= kernel parameter. But I am afraid I am quite a bit behind recent changes in that area. Provide full output of

journalctl -b --no-pager --full

as root, upload to https://paste.opensuse.org/

7

I use a 4k-monitor and have set

FONT=ter-132b

in my /etc/vconsole.conf file.

Are you sure that “FONT=ter-v32b” is correct?

8

Yes, ter-v32b is definitively correct.
I did try that name before using setfont tool in virtual console.
Yes, ter-132b is also correct.

There are many variants:

espinosa@dell-xps-3:/usr/share/kbd/consolefonts> find . -name 'ter-*32*.psfu'
./ter-i32b.psfu
./ter-h32n.psfu
./ter-k32b.psfu
./ter-g32n.psfu
./ter-732n.psfu
./ter-c32n.psfu
./ter-p32n.psfu
./ter-h32b.psfu
./ter-m32b.psfu
./ter-c32b.psfu
./ter-132b.psfu
./ter-d32b.psfu
./ter-i32n.psfu
./ter-232n.psfu
./ter-p32b.psfu
./ter-u32n.psfu
./ter-k32n.psfu
./ter-932n.psfu
./ter-g32b.psfu
./ter-v32n.psfu
./ter-732b.psfu
./ter-v32b.psfu
./ter-m32n.psfu
./ter-932b.psfu
./ter-d32n.psfu
./ter-u32b.psfu
./ter-232b.psfu
./ter-132n.psfu

I tried to switch between
setfont ter-v32b
setfont ter-132b
…and there doesn’t seem to be any visible difference.

9

@espinosa_cz rebuild initrd dracut -f --regenerate-all

10

Plymouth is using whatever resolution kernel is using which should be what is set in video= kernel

I’m not so sure about that. I suspect that Plymouth follows GFXMODE and GFXPAYLOAD.

Quoting from https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/GRUB/Tips_and_tricks:

4.1 Setting the framebuffer resolution
GRUB can set the framebuffer for both GRUB itself (GFXMODE) and the kernel (GFXPAYLOAD). The old vga= way is deprecated. The preferred method is editing /etc/default/grub to set width (pixels) x height (pixels) x color depth:
GRUB_GFXMODE=1024x768x32
GRUB_GFXPAYLOAD_LINUX=keep

No mention of video= there. I’m not even sure if they talk about the old grub or grub2 and what is relevant to openSuse.
Anyway, this is getting too off-topic. Let’s start a new thread for that.

11

I solved my small console fonts by keeping the large terminus ter-v32b font in my vconsole.conf and rather switching Plymouth off.

I disabled Plymouth by adding
plymouth.enable=0 to Kernel Parameters through Yast Bootloader config UI:

image
image1887×924 82.3 KB

I’m not really sure what was Plymouth for. My boot always flickered annoyingly between text console, graphic and resolutions anyway. Splash screen was off (set by OS, not by me).

12

Additional note: using Plymouth and setting Terminus font in /etc/vconsole.conf caused instability of the whole system. I experienced random hang-ups, especially when switching between virtual consoles (Plasma X11 to a text virtual console) and even when using a text virtual console alone, like when editing text in vim.

At one point, I couldn’t even boot my system at all, I had to do hard reset. Setting nosimplefb=0 seems to help. It was nosimplefb=1 before.
I have no idea what nosimplefb boot kernel parameter exactly does; it can be some kind of relict I keep rolling from old times. I haven’t re-installed openSuse on this laptop for last 2 years or so.

13

This topic was automatically closed 7 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.