[SOLVED] Problem when using HDMI port on laptops

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felipejgribeiro

New Member
Jul 8, 2023
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Hi all,

I have two old laptops with proxmox installed in both of them, working fine with VMs, LXCs, etc...
I bought a small kvm switch to work with both of the laptops with only 1 hdmi video screen, mouse and keyboard when I need to access them directly when boot fails or anything else I can't do via SSH for example.
They problem is when I try to use it, no image is displayed on the hdmi screen. I want to use this only for the proxmox hosts/servers. I don't want to passtrough anything to use the HDMI in a VM.
One thing that worked was to reboot the laptop with the kvm switch configured to use it and keep until the boot is done. The prompt shows fine and I can use it. BUT when I change the kvm to use the other laptop and then go back to the first one the display is not working anymore.
In both I configured the
Code: 
/etc/systemd/logind.conf
with
Code: 
HandleLidSwitch=ignore
so the laptops don't sleep when I close the lid and this is working fine.
But when I try to use the HDMI nothing happens. It looks like the main laptop display is still on even with the lid closed.
Any ideas/suggestions?

Thanks!
 
You kinda have to realize, this is not a normal use-case for proxmox. It's a hypervisor. Kinda used to running headless, with basic TTY login functionality provided at the console for "convenience" and likely emergency-use.

Typically you access the proxmox rootshell from the Web GUI via another pc, or ssh.

If you want an all-in-one desktop system, you can do that - it's built on Debian. This would likely solve your problem with the HDMI out to monitor, although I have no guarantees - you would have to test it.

Just be aware that a full desktop environment is going to be taking resources away from VMs and CTRs. I would recommend something like icewm or fluxbox, possibly Enlightenment or XFCE4 (and a minimum of browser tabs open) if you want to go resource-light. If you have at least 8-16GB RAM you should be more-or-less OK depending on what you want to run for VMs, but a modern 64-bit desktop is probably going to use ~1GB of RAM with the browser. And that's before ZFS ARC, if you're using it.

https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Developer_Workstations_with_Proxmox_VE_and_X11
 
Hi @Kingneutron . Thanks for the reply, but I don't intend to use them as workstations.
These 2 laptops are inside a server cabinet and is not that easy when I need to access them, like when upgrading from proxmox 7 to 8, for example. It's not a good idea to do this via SSH or Web GUI because if anything happens, I need to have access to the console (the "real" console). The ideia is not to use the HDMI on a daily basis but just when I need to troubleshoot the server without the need to take the laptop out from the shelf and etc. Like you mentioned, for emergency-use. That's my only use case for this situation.
One day I had an attached SSD with some problem and the boot was stuck and I had to use the console from the laptop since the network didn't even start. Using a KVM attached to all my proxmox servers it will be way more easier to do this.
 
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