[mythtv-users] How can I get my monitorless backend to start up

Brian Wood beww at beww.org
Fri Apr 17 21:45:03 UTC 2009


On Friday 17 April 2009 15:16:56 Steve V wrote:
> I am trying to set up a backend which will be monitorless and also without
> keyboard and mouse. I have MythBuntu 8.10 installed.
>
> I am planning to use VNC to manage the backend. VNC works fine if I first
> boot the backend with a monitor attached.
>
> Problem is that the backend will not start up completely without a monitor.
> In this state I can ping the backend and I can connect via Putty, but,
> Mythfrontend cannot connect to the backend and VNC server has not started.
>
> When the the backend is started without a monitor and I then connect a
> monitor It looks like I am in an X window (newbie on Linux so hopefully
> that is the correct description) with warnings about no monitor and that
> resolution has been set to default, pushing Ok or cancel I get an error
> (from the monitor) that the frequency is out of range. Only choice is to
> reboot with the monitor connected.
>
> I expect there is some setting that I can set which tells system not to
> check for a monitor (and perhaps to set to last known good
> reolution/output).
>
> I would appreciate any help.

Often there is a BIOS setting that says something like "Halt on all errors", 
unsetting this is normal for headless operation (which is what you are 
wanting to do is called), this is typical for server operation.

But this normally has nothing to do with whether a monitor is connected or 
not, the system BIOS has no way to know this.

Obviously your X setup is looking for a monitor. You really don't need X to 
run the way you describe, but it's likely Mythbuntu won't run properly 
without X. 

Some KVM switches fake out the video card to make it think a monitor is 
connected.

But the only way you are going to solve your problem is to change your X 
setup, it sounds like it is trying to probe for the allowable values your 
monitor supports, you need to hard-code your desired values into your 
xorg.conf file.

Hopefully someone more familiar with Mythbuntu than I am (I don't use it) can 
help you with more specific info.

Of course you could just boot with the monitor attached, and disconnect it 
once things are running. A working Myth backend does not need to be re-booted 
very often (months or even years in my case).

-- 
beww
beww at beww.org


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