# Disabling the framebuffer console in post 4.14 kernels

**URL:** <https://forum.openwrt.org/t/disabling-the-framebuffer-console-in-post-4-14-kernels/209256>\
**Category:** For Developers\
**Created:** [September 2, 2024, 2:24am UTC](https://forum.openwrt.org/t/disabling-the-framebuffer-console-in-post-4-14-kernels/209256 "2024-09-02T02:24:09Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![detly](https://forum.openwrt.org/user_avatar/forum.openwrt.org/detly/32/23107_2.png) [@detly](https://forum.openwrt.org/u/detly)\
**Post date:** [September 2, 2024, 2:24am UTC](https://forum.openwrt.org/t/disabling-the-framebuffer-console-in-post-4-14-kernels/209256/1 "2024-09-02T02:24:09Z")

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In 4.14 kernels, you could prevent the console from appearing on the framebuffer altogether by unsetting `CONFIG_FRAMEBUFFER_CONSOLE` (or forcing it to `=n`). I used this to make sure my framebuffer-based LCD display did not get overwritten by kernel messages or the cursor.

It seems that this hasn't worked since [this commit](https://github.com/openwrt/openwrt/commit/9c0ddafd4663948fe5c6f3f4a7a7601fdbb36737):

> As of commit in kernel:
> 
> 6104c37094 fbcon: Make fbcon a built-time depency for fbdev framebuffer console is build in into framebuffer module and there's no standalone fbcon module. Therefore drop the kmod-fbcon and enable console in kmod-fb. The only targets which use these modules are imx6 and geode, both are on kernel 4.14 so no fallback for other kernels is introduced.
> 
> Being at that this commit also fixes autoload of fbdev for x86.

Am I right in thinking that that commit effectively hard-codes `CONFIG_FRAMEBUFFER_CONSOLE=y` in a way that can't be disabled through later config? If that's the case, is there a way to disable the framebuffer console other than patching that kernel module directly to disable the console functionality?
