[syslinux] menu.c32 dies without VGA until version 5

Ferenc Wagner
Mon, 01 Jul 2013 09:12:08 -0000

Hi,

Try running menu.c32 from Syslinux 4.06 under qemu -vga none without
disabling console output, for example:

SERIAL 0
SAY ls menu
LABEL ls
  COM32 ls.c32
LABEL menu
  COM32 menu.c32

This invocation works well:

$ qemu -hda extlinux.img -serial stdio

But this fails after invoking "menu":

$ qemu -hda extlinux.img -serial stdio -vga none

Syslinux 5.xx and 6.xx does not exhibit this issue.  I understand that
4.xx is history now, but it's still widely used in distributions.  Is
there an easy fix for this?  The core and ls.c32 seems to work well
without VGA, but menu.c32 won't.  Adding CONSOLE 0 to the config works
around the issue, but I hit this problem preparing a generic boot menu.
--
Thanks,
Feri.