How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?
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Hi pfSense Gurus!
Strange, but pfSense / FreeBSD booting stage looks like "from early 60s": 640 x 480 pix !
Ok, I also love vintage stuff, but... now are 2021 !From emotions back to question:
How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?For example how to implement this logic:
Resolution based on LCD monitor size for local-attached VGA Display)
Monitor size - Recommended resolution (in pixels)
17-inch standard ratio LCD monitor - 1024 × 768
19-inch standard ratio LCD monitor - 1280 × 1024
20-inch standard ratio LCD monitor - 1600 × 1200
20- and 22-inch widescreen LCD monitors - 1680 × 1050
24-inch widescreen LCD monitor - 1920 × 1200Laptop screen size - Recommended resolution (in pixels) (for local-attached separate VGA Console device or notebook thru USB-COM adapter)
13- to 15-inch standard ratio laptop screen - 1400 × 1050
13- to 15-inch widescreen laptop screen - 1280 × 800
17-inch widescreen laptop screen - 1680 × 105032-bit color for all (less is not using anymore in common displays)
This mean when FreeBSD starting (and after, the pfSense starting), each Console output automatically set to have different screen resolution according to attached device's screen size.
How to doing this better way ?
Thank You an advice for detailed explanation!
P.S. Nothing from here help me...
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I don't setup pfSense that often on UEFI kit with 'big' monitors but I have noticed that when the PC is set to boot UEFI only, without BIOS compatibility, the console displayed is a type of GUI console that displays graphical logos with text in a resolution 1024x768 and higher. If your kit has UEFI, set it to UEFI only and try the install again.
The screen resolution support might be down to the EFI implementation on the motherboard. I have successfully used Clover EFI and NVMe storage on some older BIOS only servers with FreeBSD and had complete control over the GUI console resolution in the config.plist for Clover.
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@sergei_shablovsky said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
Strange, but pfSense / FreeBSD booting stage looks like "from early 60s": 640 x 480 pix !
That made me smile. I went to school in the seventies and I remember back in 1978 using a telephone handset in a modem coupler to connect my 'console' to the computer many miles away.
My console was a teletype, it had no screen, just a large roll of paper, impact hammers for each character and an inked ribbon. The programs we wrote were saved encoded on sequences of holes punched out of cards or on small rolls of paper tape. A 640x480 VGA monitor would have been something from science fiction.
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At that point it's all FreeBSD, so you'd want to look up how to change it on FreeBSD. It also depends on your video driver and whether it boots using BIOS or UEFI. The default console type is VT, but can be set to SC manually.
If you search around the FreeBSD forum and elsewhere there are plenty of suggestions.
It has come up before on the forum, so perhaps your search terms are not quite right. See this thread for example.
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@vmb said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
I don't setup pfSense that often on UEFI kit with 'big' monitors but I have noticed that when the PC is set to boot UEFI only, without BIOS compatibility, the console displayed is a type of GUI console that displays graphical logos with text in a resolution 1024x768 and higher. If your kit has UEFI, set it to UEFI only and try the install again.
Thank You for suggestion.
Sorry for my bad English, when I describe situation at the start "pfSense / FreeBSD booting stage" that mean VGA local-connected by cable display AFTER POST procedure and loading device BIOS (RAIDs, NICs, etc). -
@vmb said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
@sergei_shablovsky said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
Strange, but pfSense / FreeBSD booting stage looks like "from early 60s": 640 x 480 pix !
That made me smile. I went to school in the seventies and I remember back in 1978 using a telephone handset in a modem coupler to connect my 'console' to the computer many miles away.
Because of smile I wrote about "emotions" :)
My console was a teletype, it had no screen, just a large roll of paper, impact hammers for each character and an inked ribbon. The programs we wrote were saved encoded on sequences of holes punched out of cards or on small rolls of paper tape. A 640x480 VGA monitor would have been something from science fiction.
I not so "old super star" like You :) but I also have experience with bulk packs of cards. :) After some time 8 than 16 than 32 colors...
Amazing, magic times! -
@jimp said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
At that point it's all FreeBSD, so you'd want to look up how to change it on FreeBSD. It also depends on your video driver and whether it boots using BIOS or UEFI. The default console type is VT, but can be set to SC manually.
Nowadays approx 99% of sysadmins & security engineers have no displays less 17' around them. On hundreds of miles around. Even finding the Wintel on a BIOS are "near to impossible" mission.
So 1024 x 768 must be MIN of resolution.Why to be so sticky to very old resolutions? Unreasonable and create the bad User Experience for pfSense for newbies.
If you search around the FreeBSD forum and elsewhere there are plenty of suggestions.
You are absolutely right, FreeBSD's forums are better please for here, but anyway, pfSense are on top of FreeBSD and we all need useful UI/UX to make less mistakes and be more productive.
It has come up before on the forum, so perhaps your search terms are not quite right. See this thread for example.
The same link I send to You. :) For all times only TWO questions. May be other peoples prefer hardcore CLI rather "work just out of the box" :)
I also wrote here to point an attention about needs to cut off VERY OLD standard and just stay with what we have right now.
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The monitor size doesn't matter. It's a matter of being able to drive the video card appropriately, which in many cases isn't possible. Some VESA modes may work but mostly you have to worry about dumb things like video drivers consuming memory and kernel resources better spent on firewall tasks.
It's a firewall, it's not meant to have a fancy display. You only need the monitor to install or in an rare occasions to work the console if the GUI/ssh are unreachable.
You can change it if you want for your hardware but there is no one general solution we can guarantee will work for everyone, so we won't change from the default.
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@jimp said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
It has come up before on the forum, so perhaps your search terms are not quite right. See this thread for example.
In this thread is more about local VGA Console, but my question are about system-wide change, - both for local-connected VGA Console, local-connected COM Console. (I not touch Remote SSH session screen size because that is more 20+ popular apps on *NIX, 10-20 - on Mac a a dozen - on Win, and each app keep "own window size' depend on app developer vision)
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@jimp said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
At that point it's all FreeBSD, so you'd want to look up how to change it on FreeBSD. It also depends on your video driver and whether it boots using BIOS or UEFI. The default console type is VT, but can be set to SC manually.
If you search around the FreeBSD forum and elsewhere there are plenty of suggestions.
It has come up before on the forum, so perhaps your search terms are not quite right. See this thread for example.
Ok, just based on FreeBSD vidcontrol docs and FreeBSD Changing Console Video Modes and table at start of this topic, how to set VGA to 1600 × 1200 and COM to 1400 × 1050 ?
Thank You for detailed explanation.
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Serial ports have no resolution. That's up to your terminal. The default shell prompt already runs a little utility called
resizewinwhich probes the terminal for its window size and sets the rows/columns appropriately without you having to do anything. It works fine withscreen,PuTTY,SecureCRT, and most other serial clients I've used. I keep my terminal set to eitherscreenorxtermthough I'm not sure what the specific requirements for that are.As for the video console, as I said, that depends on your hardware and its capabilities, if the drivers are available, etc. For a general solution for basic modes, see the posts in the other thread I linked, but that won't get you a high resolution console mode.
We aren't including tons of video drivers or X11 parts to drive graphical features because they don't belong on a firewall. They take up space, resources, add potential security problems, and are unnecessary in this role.
Remember: Upvote with the 👍 button for any user/post you find to be helpful, informative, or deserving of recognition!
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Do not Chat/PM for help!
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@jimp said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
Serial ports have no resolution. That's up to your terminal. The default shell prompt already runs a little utility called
resizewinwhich probes the terminal for its window size and sets the rows/columns appropriately without you having to do anything. It works fine withscreen,PuTTY,SecureCRT, and most other serial clients I've used. I keep my terminal set to eitherscreenorxtermthough I'm not sure what the specific requirements for that are.As for the video console, as I said, that depends on your hardware and its capabilities, if the drivers are available, etc. For a general solution for basic modes, see the posts in the other thread I linked, but that won't get you a high resolution console mode.
We aren't including tons of video drivers or X11 parts to drive graphical features because they don't belong on a firewall. They take up space, resources, add potential security problems, and are unnecessary in this role.
I agree with most of Your arguments about not to including tons of drivers.
But including VGA Resolution I,m asking in previous message (1600 x 1200 and 1280 x 1024) looks very reasonable because almost all of users have modern displays with a high size.
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@jimp said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
The monitor size doesn't matter. It's a matter of being able to drive the video card appropriately, which in many cases isn't possible. Some VESA modes may work but mostly you have to worry about dumb things like video drivers consuming memory and kernel resources better spent on firewall tasks.
Carefully reading this 4 links
https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/changing-screen-resolution.60979/
https://www.reddit.com/r/PFSENSE/comments/fbuukj/how_to_change_monitor_resolution/
https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=vidcontrol&sektion=1&format=html
https://docs.freebsd.org/en/books/handbook/book/#consoles
But still have no clear vision how to achieve my goal: see 1024x768 (or 1280x1024) on my monitor.P.S. Need to note, not all of cards for remote servers management (like iRSC in IBM, iRMC in Fujtsu-Siemens, iDRAC in Dell) able to capturing or redirect on-screen video with resolution that exceeds 1600 ×1200, many has upper limit 1280 × 1024, and very old (7-10years age) models have 1024x768 24/32bit color depth limit.
So, in case when SysAdmin need both remote control thru the BMC card AND control thru local monitor simultaneously, I need to be able to set VGA resolution one from this 3 variants:
1024 x 768
1280 x 1024
1600 x 1200 -
@jimp said in How to set different certain screen resolution on FreeBSD and pfSense boot for VGA and COM Console output ?:
The monitor size doesn't matter. It's a matter of being able to drive the video card appropriately, which in many cases isn't possible. Some VESA modes may work but mostly you have to worry about dumb things like video drivers consuming memory and kernel resources better spent on firewall tasks.
Thank You again one time for suggestion.
From this point of view where better to place the settings for screen resolution (/boot/loader.conf, /boot/loader.conf.local, Advanced / System Tunables) to not losing settings after pfSense system update?
