[bishopcop]

I've come up on a weird issue where I have a IP KVM hooked up to my Octane2.  This enables me to see to VGA output and control the computer through the keyboard and mouse ports.  This works fine, I can remotely control the computer without any issues.  The problem comes up if through a remote terminal I reboot the system.  For some reason it doesn't start clogin and 4Dwm, I get the simple XDM login and once I login I get a blank screen.  I managed to change the Xsession file to start a terminal on login, however because the 4Dwm does not start, I cannot start the toolchest or any other program from the terminal.  Is there a way to force the loading of clogin and the rest?  I already have chkconfig set to load the desktop, enabled visual login and the rest.  I don't know why it defaults to xdm on reboot.

Cheers,
Bish.

[weblacky]

Dumb question, but for clarity on your issue, does the problem occur on EVERY reboot using the KVM, or only reboots where you DON'T have the Octane "in focus" on the KVM during full reboot (all the way to login screen)?

Many KVMs don't have EDID-like emulation, they literally disconnect the monitor (even though most emulate the persistently connected mouse and keyboard on loss of focus). I've heard of systems attempting to detect monitor properties at X startup, if they can't they default to a "worst-case" scenario. I'm going to assume (without more info), that this is what's happening here.

I'm going to assume you are rebooting the system "headless", then re-attaching the head (KVM focus) after startup and assuming it will be waiting for you and look all good.

In my limited KVM on SGI experiences, you need to reboot and maintain full KVM focus until the entire X session has started, then I think you can disconnect/reconnect the monitor all you want.

[bishopcop]

Yes, I figured that the KVM does not emulate the VGA connection properly.  I wonder if it is possible to force the full X startup without the monitor detection.  I've tried to reset with full KVM focus but still plain X.  I did try reboot with the monitor connected directly and mouse keyboard through KVM, the full X works in that case.  So maybe the detection can be bypassed, or even if no monitor detected, the full 4Dwm is still loaded.

Edit:  Looked into this a bit more.  Like you said, the Ip KVM does not emulate EDID info.  Need to use an EDID emulator pass-through device to make the monitor detection proper.  Ebay has plenty of this stuff usually used, for fairly cheap.