Corrupted menus on installation, bad rendering

ocroquette

Hi,

I am new to pfSense. I installed it on a ALIX APU1C over the serial connection.
The Live mode works great, the serial connection works too, but as soon as menus are displayed, the problems start. The rendering is just wrong (see attachments). The content of the different screens and within a screen are mixed up. This makes the custom installation very difficult. The many screenshots of the great online documentation [1] helped me to find my way through the installation in half-blind mode, and I finally managed to perform the installation.

I tried different options for the serial connection, different SW terminals (gtkterm, Hyperterminal, Putty), with the exact same outcome.

I also found out that if I start the live OS, enable SSH, and start the installation over SSH, then the menus are rendered correctly.

Now I know a workaround and my system is installed, but does anyone know the cause of the problem and a solution ?

Cheers,
Olivier

[1] https://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Installing_pfSense

ocn0714a_005.jpg_thumb

jimp

Hyperterminal is known to do that. PuTTY should work fine, provided you don't have the serial window set too small. Make sure it's at least 25 rows high and 80 wide, bigger is OK.

ocroquette

OK, I just tested it again. What works:

Windows + Putty + Native serial port

What doesn't:

Windows + Hyperterminal + Native serial port
Linux + gtkterm + USB converter

This can cause quite some frustration for newcomers like me. Has the root cause ever been investigated ?

In any case, thanks for your help and your work!