tty 80x25 not available

[joyko]

I boot Knoppix 7.0.3 in text-only mode (run level 3). I prefer to have nice big fonts with 80x25 resolution. Every manual says that "vga=normal" will do the job. But this does not work.

With "vga=normal" boot begins in 80x25 mode, but then as soon as video card is recognized screen immediately changes to 132x50 resolution, and remains such forever.

With "vga=ask" I get a number of suggestions, and 80x25 among them ("F00"). But if F00 is chosen, the situation is exactly repeated: screen is originally 80x25, but 132x50 after video detection.

After quite some experimenting, I found the following solution: specify "nomodeset" kernel parameter. Now I get what I want, resolution remains 80x25 forever. But I feel unsatisfied, because this is not a solution but rather a "dirty trick". Is there a way to *instruct* knoppix to load exactly the mode which *I* want?

[utu]

Greetings, joyko.

Refer to the Knoppix cheatcodes, probably on your system at:
/mnt-system/KNOPPIX/knoppix-cheatcodes.txt

You can change your default boot configuration at
/mnt-system/boot/syslinux/syslinux.cfg
by adding the nomodeset cheatcode found there.

That is, assuming your current DEFAULT is DEFAULT knoppix vga=normal,
change this to DEFAULT knoppix vga=normal nomodeset.

You can try this out before you change anything, just adding
your 'dirty tricks' to the initial prompt. When you find the right
ones, then change syslinux.cfg to make it 'permanent'.

[joyko]

Thanks utu! As I said, in principle nomodeset solves my problem, and I get what I need. But I don't like such solution, since I always want to understand what happens. Why knoppix refuses to boot 80x25 with vga=normal (but without nomodese)? For example, Enterprise Linux has no problem with 80x25, just specify vga=normal or vga=785. So, I'd like to understand what is going on and what is the "correct" or "regular" way to choose the screen resolution.

[utu]

I would expect a 'real' understanding might require one to really understand
both Knoppix's particular init and its X11/xorg procedures in some detail.

I thought I was answering a question on how to *instruct* Knoppix; the answer
for which, quite often, is to use a cheatcode.