HOWTO: Grub Customizer

[drs305]

Just to tidy things up - is there any way to remove all the existing unwanted entries in G.C. ?

Again - many thanks!

That's what GC was designed to do. If you untick any of the entries you don't want displayed GC should do that for you.

[2CV67]

It has cleared them out of the grub.cfg file & out of the grub screen OK.

But they still show inside G.C. & I don't see how to clear them out of there.



They don't actually exist anywhere, do they - unlike all the other unchecked items, which really exist but I choose not to show?

[drs305]

Not seeing them in the menu is the important thing and at least that part of the issue is resolved.

Although I too am curious about it, I'll just have to wait to see if what GC's creator thinks. He checks posts in here from time to time and may be able to shed some more/better light on this.

[2CV67]

OK & thanks!

As you say - the important part is working OK now.

[2CV67]

Can I use Grub Customizer (or anything else) to increase the text size on the Grub Screen?

I expected that changing the resolution would do it, but have tried both extremes (320x200x8 & 1280x1024x24) with no visible difference.

All suggestions gratefully received!

[drs305]

Can I use Grub Customizer (or anything else) to increase the text size on the Grub Screen?

I expected that changing the resolution would do it, but have tried both extremes (320x200x8 & 1280x1024x24) with no visible difference.

All suggestions gratefully received!

Have you checked which resolutions are supported by Grub on your system?

At the Grub menu press 'c' to get to the grub terminal and type:

vbeinfo

This will show the resolutions available to Grub. If the ones you tried aren't listed, it would have returned to the default and you would not have seen a change. Select one of the first resolutions listed (bigger fonts) and place that value in the /etc/default/grub file (Or try it with Grub Customizer - I can't check at the moment but I believe it should allow you to select on of the available resolutions).

[2CV67]

Thanks very much for your suggestions.

I should have mentioned that I had already been round that loop, but I just did it again to be sure.

vbeinfo gives me a screenful of options of which the top few are invisible but the rest go from 400x300x15 to 1280x1024x32.

In Grub Customizer > Preferences > Appearance, the original value was 1280x1024.
There are 50 choices in GC, ranging from 320x200x8 to 1280x1024x24.
All the options in GC are also in vbeinfo (except the invisible first few).
GC doesn't offer the x32 options from vbeinfo.

From the default 1280x1024 setting in GC, I tried the extreme 320x200x8 but then was not sure it was legitimate, so tried 640x480x8 which is in both GC & vbeinfo.
I did not try any ...x16 or other.
That is how it is set at the moment.

Looking in /etc/default/grub, I see: GRUB_GFXMODE="640x480x8"
Anything I select in GC & save, appears OK in ../grub.
But the Grub Screen is unchanged.

So I suppose GC is successfully doing all it can in updating ../grub, but something else is not taking over?

[drs305]

2CV67,

I don't know why your graphics aren't working properly.

Here is something you can play with if you have the time. It will try to change the resolution from the grub prompt.

At the Grub menu, type 'c' to get to the grub prompt.
Type the following.
What it will do is set the new resolution. You have to exit the gfxterm and re-enter to have the resolution changed. You should see the txt size change in the menu.

set gfxmode=1024x768
terminal_output console
terminal_output gfxterm
ESC to return to menu, which should reflect the new resolution.
set gfxmode=640x480
terminal_output console
terminal_output gfxterm
ESC to the main menu

At least we can see if your system responds.

Also, I don't know if we discussed this earlier, but I am assuming you are running in gfxterm mode by default and haven't removed the # from the "GRUB_TERMINAL=console" in /etc/default/grub.

[2CV67]

Thank you so much for your patience!

No - I haven't removed the # from the "GRUB_TERMINAL=console" in /etc/default/grub.

set gfxmode=640x480
terminal_output console
terminal_output gfxterm
ESC to the main menu

gave exactly the result I am looking for.
But only for one time.
Next boot it was back to tiny text again.

Not sure where that leads...

[2CV67]

Ah! - I found something.

I also have "Startup Manager" installed.
I tried it before installing GC, but never used it as it did not even allow choosing which kernels to display.

I just looked at it & found 2 resolution settings:
1. Under Boot options > Display > Resolution; I saw 1600x1200.
2. Under Advanced > Bootloader resolution; I saw 1024x768.

I tried playing with 1. & can't see any reaction.
Playing with 2. directly influences the Grub Screen display resolution & setting to 640x480 gives the result I want.

Out of curiosity, I put different values in both (1. = 1280x1024 & 2. = 800x600).
This produced an intermediate sized Grub Screen (800x600) but when I look in /etc/default/grub, I still see 640x480x8.

My conclusion so far:
GC controls /etc/default/grub.
The Grub screen is controlled by Startup Manager, but I don't know how or where.

I suppose I can either use SM to set my Grub Screen or uninstall it & hope that hands back control to GC.

Explanations & recommendations?

Thanks!