Pi not showing on TV initially

SnipedintheHead

So I've recently moved my system from a bunch of parts on a table into a complete arcade cabinet, with all the bits and pieces in hiding. Because of this, I have gone from turning parts on individually to turning them all on via surge protector. With a flip of the button, everything is turned on at once, nice, right?

Well, my Pi at the moment will not display to the TV at first. The TV just shows up as no signal. However, if I leave everything else on, but unplug and replug the pi back in, it shows up exactly like it should through the HDMI and onto the TV. My assumption is that it's a timing issue. At some point the Pi looks, realizes the TV isn't on and shuts off. I assume that, although because I have little to no knowledge on what is going on, I really don't know. What could be the issue and is there an easy fix?

Thanks, as always, for the help guys!

edmaul69

@SnipedintheHead in /boot/config.txt you need to remove the hashtag in front of force hdmi. It is switching to composite because its not detecting the tv right away

SnipedintheHead

So that worked, thank you.

Now, however, it's brought up another problem. Prior to this, my Pi would play at full screen with no problems. Now, however, it's coming up not full screen, but a much smaller resolution. The splash video that plays at the beginning is smaller as well, allowing me to see the EmulationStation Boot Screen come up behind it. How do I fix that?

edmaul69

@SnipedintheHead im not sure. It is still booting too fast. The tv needs to power on first.

edmaul69

Forcing it to boot the correct mode might work. In config.txt change hdmi_mode and hdmi_group to your tv's output. Different modes and groups are listed in here:

http://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/tags/config.txt/info

SnipedintheHead

@edmaul69

Yeah, I'm still having the issues. If I force a Resolution, the TV won't pick up (even though I still have it forced, as above). But if I force it, it comes in terrible resolution, until I restart the system. Once I do that, it comes back up at full resolution.

So it seems that the Pi is definitely moving too quickly on the boot. I wonder how to solve it.

Lyle_JP

@SnipedintheHead You need to find out which modes are supported by your television.

This command will give you that valid list:
/opt/vc/bin/tvservice -m CEA

Since you really like the way it looks when it boots up with the TV already on, you can run this command to find that mode's setting:
/opt/vc/bin/tvservice -s

Use those settings in your config.txt. CEA values use hdmi_group=1 (proper for most consumer televisions. If you're using a computer monitor instead, use DMT)

SnipedintheHead

@Lyle_JP
I'll try that in the morning, thanks.

SnipedintheHead

@Lyle_JP

That worked. Thanks! I thought I had done that earlier, but it seems I had missed something in the process. Seems to be working now.