Support question: opnsense requires input when booting

[technotic]

Hi guys,

Hopefully someone can provide some insight for me on a minor issue that has me stumped. I'm not all that familiar with bsd (only opnsense) but pretty experienced with Linux, and I thought I knew grub well enough.

So here's the issue. I run a mini PC appliance from AliExpress. Celeron n5105, 16gb ddr4, 4x i226v, rj45 console. I run the device headless. Uefi boot, but device type or method doesn't seem to matter. I keep my rj45 serial to USB cable plugged in 24/7 through the wall to my living room by where I usually use my laptop.

When I reboot the machine, it boots straight up with no input required if my console cable is connected to my laptop and laptop is on. If laptop is off/asleep, the boot hangs waiting for user input. I have to open my laptop, open a putty connection, and press enter. Then the boot continues. There's no indicator in dmesg of course as the boot process doesn't start until I hit enter. If I plug in my portable 7inch HDMI LCD, it also boots straight up. Basically, anything that would let me see the prompt, keeps it from prompting 😂 I tried using an HDMI dummy adapter but it doesn't make a difference. I tried leaving my wireless kb USB dongle plugged in, doesn't make a difference. This bios has a ton of things but lacks the basic "wait for input, continue on all errors, etc" option.

I honestly can't tell if the POST is waiting for input or the bootloader. When I press enter, it immediately begins the boot without showing the bootloader menu, so it leads me to believe it's actually bootloader config that's waiting for the input. My loader.conf and menu config are unmodified. Actually the entire /boot is unmodified except whatever opnsense has changed. This install was a fresh install of 23.1. I haven't found an answer from searching, but surely someone knows this and it's a really simple change.

Fwiw, I don't mind disabling vga console if that would fix it. I only use the serial console (console redirect is also enable and configured properly in bios).

Side note: occasionally, connecting over console shows nothing on the screen and accepts no input. Just the blinky cursor. To fix it I just reboot the system, which then shows the shutdown sequence on the console and accepts input once reset, no idea what causes that.

Thanks in advance for your help!

[franco]

Hi,

A connected keyboard or serial line could cause this by throwing garbage at the boot making it stall (in the boot menu I suppose).


Cheers,
Franco

[technotic]

Hey franco,

Reviving this because I still have the issue and have been unable to fix it. I just read through this thread https://forum.opnsense.org/index.php?topic=3972.15 and it was inciteful, though obviously several years old.

I've tried using a dummy HDMI dongle with no success. I even tried with the dummy HDMI dongle and a usb keyboard dongle attached with no luck. note that it does actually boot without needing interaction when using a real HDMI display and the same usb keyboard dongle with the keyboard powered on (it would only be a band-aid fix to leave my usb wireless keyboard powered on 24/7 or have a wired keyboard permanently attached to the device). Possibly my HDMI dummy dongle is bad, it's possible, but I would estimate the chance of that being pretty low, even with Chinesium standards.

If I have the console connected and putty open on the com port (using an RJ45 to USB serial cable) the boot menu briefly pops up for opnsense, then boots. without being connected to the com port, I have to connect to the com port, press enter, and then boot proceeds.

I did the install completely over serial, downloading the dvd iso, dd'ing it to the plugged in usb flash drive, manual boot selecting it, setting the console boot option, etc etc. i don't have the usb flash drive configured as a bootable option in my UEFI boot config settings. its definitely the opnsense boot menu waiting for input.

i have a strong linux background, but my only bsd experience is with opnsense. I *still* get frustrated every time i type "ip a" and get an error 

My current console settings are attached. Primary is serial. Secondary is VGA. I will try to adjust these settings (will I lose any console messages by setting serial console for secondary?), such as trying EFI console for primary, serial as secondary, or VGA as primary with dongle inserted, and serial as secondary. I'm guessing one of these will fix my issue, but I'd like to definitely resolve this and be able to provide the solution and mark as solved, for anyone else encountering this, since its the top google hit for my search terms. took me a second to realize I was reading my own post 

[technotic]

So an update:

I tried setting secondary console to Serial Console

I tried primary with VGA, EFI, and Mute, all still require me to connect the console and press enter.

I'm at a loss. I'm okay with disabling the boot menu, but I'm not sure how with opnsense. If I need rescue mode or something, I can USB boot. This might be my only solution, to boot the kernel directly without the menu.

[chemlud]

If the HDMI monitor works, the HDMI dongle (correctly wired) should work as well. I use such a China-device (not exactly the same for sure) without any problems. Did you install headless or with monitor? Maybe try the other way arround and import your config.xml...