To start off, I am running Slackware 11.0 with a custom compiled 2.6.21.5 kernel on a Gateway MX6448 laptop. I have ACPI enabled, and suspend/resume works just fine while X is running, but the problem that I am having is that if I suspend the computer from the terminal (as in tty0-6, and I use acpitool) it will suspend just fine, and it will even resume alright except that the backlight and/or framebuffer don't come back up. The interesting thing is that if I suspend the computer while the X server is running, I have absolutely no issues, and the display comes back up perfectly fine. It is just a console thing. NOTE: the following I might not have said too well: Now, the computer will resume back to the console, but the display will be shut down, so I can enter commands (e.g. startx will bring up the X server and I have a nice display after that, until I exit it), but I just can't see anything that I am typing. Sorry if this is confusing. If you need me to clarify I will be glad to. But now, the million dollar question:

Is there any way to fix this problem? Is there a way to turn on the backlight and/or rerun the video bios and/or reset the vesa framebuffer? I appreciate the help guys

EDIT: Also, I have tried appending the acpi_sleep=s3_mode/s3_bios/s3_bios,s3_mode parameters when booting my kernel (I used them seperately, of course). Those have successfully failed to work. Thanks again!

There is something like acpiconf (done from memory) a "man acpiconf" might help...

This question sounds hauntingly similar to a problem I had a year ago with the free ati video driver. It would lock up the computer without a kernel panic message or even a log created it was a real kernel bug that to my knowledge has yet to be fixed.

Some things to try.

Run the console with normal setting for vga in your boot loader.

if this fixes the problem then its probably something with the frame buffer driver you selected during your custom compile of the kernel. If so try just plain vesa that one seams to work the best anywhooo. (This will require you to recompile the kernel )

Note: The frame buffer driver you select in the kernel has absolutely no effect on the driver you use for X. execpt causing issues sometimes :P


If that does not solve the issue then its probably something with the video card coming out of suspend mode but I doubt this as X is able to suspend the video just fine. That or the devs for the video driver that your using in x are using some sort of trickery to get suspend to work correctly on the card <-- this is possible.

I really doubt that using plain vesa wont solve the issue as its probably the frame buffer driver not supporting acpi correctly.

Thanks for the reply, but there is no such program or manual page on my box.

I tried your suggestions, booting into normal vga mode, and using the plain vesa driver (I was doing that anyways ). VGA mode failed, as did the vesa fb driver. I have a radeon xpress 1100 IGP card, and the only thing that I could think that would help would be to compile the radeonfb driver into the kernel/module, but the odd thing is that the driver doesn't seem to connect with the card, which is really odd since it is a RADEON card! AUGH! This is infuriating to levels beyond comprehension.

Did find something out though. The fglrx module (not the X driver, the module) would mess my suspend/resume process up. ATI needs to get their act together, I think.

I am going to try one more thing, which is to compile agpgart into the kernel which might have been the problem. We'll see though. Thanks for all the help guys, I appreciate it.

Sorry, seems to be a (Free)BSD-only tool .

hmmm strange. Yeah the radeonfb driver is for the older radeon cards not the newer ones. At least that was the case last time I checked.

I am kinda out of ideas on what would be causing your issue.