[nflug] standby mode

[joshj at linuxmail.org]

Thus spake Kevin Chudy on Thu, 2 Mar 2006

> The only screensaver I was aware of was configured when Gnome was running.
> Since I don't generally need a graphical environment, I boot the system to
> runlevel 3. Without Gnome running, I didn't know where to find a (another)
> screensaver.
>
> I didn't get a chance to try Darin's suggestion yet. Hopefully later
> today.
>
> But this leads me to another question. With a Linux system that has a
> graphical desktop like Gnome installed, if you don't generally need that
> desktop, what is the best way to get into a terminal only environment,
> while still having the ability to run Gnome or another desktop if needed?
> Am I doing it correctly booting to runlevel 3, switching to runlevel 5
> when needed?

I could be wrong, but this is what I have learned in my adventures in
powersaving: I think that having the monitor turned off is ultimately
controlled by set setterm. The reason I think this is because I had
installed xscreensaver and I set it to turn my monitor off after 10
minutes. However, it would not, it would only 'black' the screen (i even
had DPMS enabled in my xorg.conf file). Somehow I came across setterm. I
have this as part of my startup scripts:

 	setterm -powersave on
 	setterm -powersave powerdown
 	setterm -powerdown 10

My motives were different from yours. But I think that you can use this.
You would do something like "setterm -powersave off" or look through
your startup scripts for where it calls setterm. check "man setterm"
there is a lot there.

For your last question: I start in runlevel 3 also. To get a gui when I
want, I do 'startx'. You configure your desktop through ~/.xinitrc . Not
sure if that is the same for runlevel 5. Then when I exit my
windowmanager I'm conveniently back on the command line.

>
> Thank you,
> Kevin
>
>
>
> "David J. Andruczyk" wrote:
>
>> --- Kevin Chudy <kchudy at mail.netsos.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> I have a system running SUSE 9.2. When using runlevel 3, if the
>>> system
>>> sits idle for about 10 minutes, the screen will go black as if the
>>> system is in standby mode. I believe I have any bios settings for
>>> power
>>> management disabled. I researched ACPI but when I perform:
>>>
>>> dmesg | grep -2i acpi
>>>
>>> I get:
>>>
>>> ACPI disabled because your bios is from 99 and to old.
>>>
>>> I do have Gnome installed although I usually boot the system to
>>> runlevel
>>> 3.
>>>
>>> So if the bios isn't turning off the monitor and the bios is too old
>>> for
>>> ACPI, what controls switching the monitor to standby?
>>
>> the screensaver...
>>
>> Dave J. Andruczyk
>>
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