Screen refresh at runlevel 3?

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dutsnekcirf
Posts: 60
Joined: 2015/11/24 20:33:44

Screen refresh at runlevel 3?

Post by dutsnekcirf » 2019/10/17 21:30:50

I suspect this is an issue specific to my graphics card.

I have a CentOS 6.10 bootdisk that boots directly into the command line; specifically runlevel 3. I use these to boot up a 1U server; most often an older model supermicro server. I've found that when I boot up the older model Supermicro servers the screen refresh rate is quick and smooth. As my login banner prints and scrolls up it scrolls up quickly and smoothly.

I've recently received some newer 1U servers that are capable of booting this disk as well. However, the screen refresh rate is much slower. It appears to be slowly printing each line one by one. Even though these are much faster, newer, more powerful servers than the previous models, they feel considerably more sluggish.

Is this a symptom of not having the proper graphics card drivers or something else? Is this just a case in which the older models are so old that their graphics drivers are now just natively included with the standard CentOS core packages? If so, I'm not sure where to begin in order to identify the graphics card model in the newer servers and where to find the corresponding video card driver that I should be loading.

Is there any sort of recommended guide that might point me in the right direction?

Thanks

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TrevorH
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Joined: 2009/09/24 10:40:56
Location: Brighton, UK

Re: Screen refresh at runlevel 3?

Post by TrevorH » 2019/10/17 21:54:46

Check the output from lsmod when booted on each of them and compare the list. Look for things mentioning 'fb' and 'vesa' and 'console' in that list and also in /var/log/messages.

Oh, might also want to look at moving it to a CentOS 7 boot disk at some point in the not too distant future - only about 1 year of CentOS 6 left now.
The future appears to be RHEL or Debian. I think I'm going Debian.
Info for USB installs on http://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/InstallFromUSBkey
CentOS 5 and 6 are deadest, do not use them.
Use the FAQ Luke

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