From Bugzilla Helper: User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; X11; Linux i686) Opera 7.21 [en] Description of problem: While in KDE GUI and pressing Ctrl-Alt-F1 to go to console mode causes the screen to be garbled. Alt-F7 restores the GUI normally. This is with a Dell Latitude Laptop with the NVidia GeForce 4 adapter, using the stock "nv" driver that comes with XFree. The resolution is set to 1280x1024. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): XFree86-4.3.0-40 How reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Start GUI either using startx or init 5 2. Press Ctrl-Alt-F1 3. Garbled screen on display 4. Alt-F7 restores GUI Actual Results: Garbled screen on laptop display Expected Results: Readable text on display Additional info: lspci reports the adapter as: 01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV17 [GeForce4 440 Go] (rev a3)
FWIW... The "work-a-round" is to install the latest nvidia drivers from the manufacturer (ie NVIDIA-Linux-x86-1.0-4496-pkg2.run). This driver provides the proper behaviour when switching to console mode and back.
This seems to be a bug in XFree 4.3 - i'm running a standard i686 PC with a Geforce3 TI, and i'm having the same problem with console mode. I use VESA framebuffer 1024x768 16bpp for console (lilo boot param "vga=791") and the latest drivers from nvidia.com, currently "NVIDIA-Linux-x86-1.0-5328-pkg1.run". The only way to get console back to usable state without rebooting, is to run a bare X server in 1024x768 16bpp (the mode that matches my console mode) and "kill -9" it forcing the screen to be left in this mode.
Please test to make sure this problem occurs in the final Fedora Core 1 OS release (this is reported against the beta). Assuming you've done that, please report this problem directly to XFree86.org via their bugzilla, located at http://bugs.xfree86.org so that the upstream "nv" driver maintainer (an Nvidia employee) is aware of the issue and may investigate and/or comment on it. Nvidia does not make the documentation for their hardware available to the open source community, and the driver source code is developed intentionally in a way that is totally obfuscated in a way that makes it more or less impossible for someone to fix bugs in it who is not an Nvidia employee with access to the technical specifications. Once you have reported your bug upstream, please paste the URL to the upstream bug report here, and I will track the issue upstream, and investigate any bug fixes that are developed, and consider them for inclusion in future updates.
Since this bugzilla report was filed, there have been several major updates to the X Window System, which may resolve this issue. Users who have experienced this problem are encouraged to upgrade to the latest version of Fedora Core, which can be obtained from: http://fedora.redhat.com/download If this issue turns out to still be reproduceable in the latest version of Fedora Core, please file a bug report in the X.Org bugzilla located at http://bugs.freedesktop.org in the "xorg" component. Once you've filed your bug report to X.Org, if you paste the new bug URL here, Red Hat will continue to track the issue in the centralized X.Org bug tracker, and will review any bug fixes that become available for consideration in future updates.