On Sat, Jan 11, 2025 at 09:14:35PM +0000, Andrew Bower wrote
>
> I got rid of the frame buffer on a recent 32-bit Devuan installation
> and it massively sped up software scrolling and indeed restored the
> venerable shift-PgUp/PgDn hardware scrolling that got lost in recent
> kernels.

Are you still able to launch X Window graphic environment? I tried
the "nomodeset" parameter years ago in Gentoo. Text yes; graphics no.

After some RTFM I've come up with a workaround to my problem in
Devuan. The file to edit is /etc/default/console-setup The two
important lines are...

FONTFACE="Fixed"
FONTSIZE="8x16"

On my 1920x1080 monitor 1920 / 8 = 240 columns across and
1080 / 16 = 67.5 (rounds down to 67) rows. That's why it's so
unreadable. According to "man console-setup"...

FONTFACE and FONTSIZE
       Valid font faces are: VGA (sizes  8x8,  8x14,  8x16,  16x28  and
       16x32),  Terminus  (sizes  6x12, 8x14, 8x16, 10x20, 12x24, 14x28
       and 16x32), TerminusBold (sizes 8x14, 8x16, 10x20, 12x24,  14x28
       and  16x32),  TerminusBoldVGA  (sizes  8x14 and 8x16), and Fixed
       (sizes  8x13,  8x14,  8x15,  8x16   and   8x18).    If   however
       CODESET=Ethiopian,  then  the  available font faces are Goha and
       GohaClassic, each in sizes 8x12, 8x14 and 8x16.

"Fixed" maxes out at 8x18 which still means 240 columns and 60 rows...
bleagh... *BUT* "VGA" offers 16x28 and 16x32.

Changing those two lines to...

FONTFACE="VGA"
FONTSIZE="16x32"

...gives me 120x33 textmode. I find that very readable on my 24"
1920x1080 LED monitor. Changing those two lines to...

FONTFACE="VGA"
FONTSIZE="16x28"

...gives me 120x38 textmode.

Some people may prefer "Terminus" or "TerminusBold".

--
There are 2 types of people in this world
1) Those who can extrapolate from incomplete data