Ubuntu 25.10 - [] characters during shutdown

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1

Ubuntu Version:
Example: 25.10

Problem Description:
During shutdown when pressing ESC get lot of unreadable characters, see screenshot

Anything to debug/solve this issue? Made a fresh install after using 25.04 (issue did not exist there)

Or is this a kind of privacy setting?

Thanks

Screenshots or Error Messages:

image
image1278×1566 335 KB

2

Let’s do some checks to see what is going on.

Getting-Under-The-Hood :hammer_and_wrench:

  • What graphics card/driver are you using (e.g., NVIDIA proprietary driver, AMD, or Intel)?
  • Assume this is a Wayland session?
  • Does the garbling only happen after you press Esc (i.e., when switching to the console messages) during shutdown or also during startup (pressing Esc after the Ubuntu logo appears)?
  • Do you have any custom kernel parameters in /etc/default/grub currently (especially those related to splash quiet framebuffer modeset etc.)?
3

hi @rubi1200

Here the answers to your questions, let me know if you need more information

  • Graphic from system details: Intel Arc Graphics (MTL) and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU-> see also below for the output
  • Yes, it’s wayland
  • During startup works as expected, only during shutdown
  • For /etc/default/grub - did not make any changes, below the contents of what is uncommented
GRUB_DEFAULT=0
GRUB_TIMEOUT_STYLE=hidden
GRUB_TIMEOUT=0
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`( . /etc/os-release && echo ${NAME} )`
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""

ubuntu-drivers devices output:

== /sys/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:01.0/0000:01:00.0 ==
modalias : pci:v000010DEd00002860sv00001043sd00001C63bc03sc00i00
vendor   : NVIDIA Corporation
model    : AD106M [GeForce RTX 4070 Max-Q / Mobile]
driver   : nvidia-driver-580-server - distro non-free
driver   : nvidia-driver-580 - distro non-free
driver   : nvidia-driver-580-server-open - distro non-free
driver   : nvidia-driver-580-open - distro non-free recommended
driver   : xserver-xorg-video-nouveau - distro free builtin

thanks

4

Thanks for all the information, very helpful.

I was trying to see if there was a specific bug reported about this but did not find anything.

It is likely some kind of a graphic or frame buffering issue when the GPU unloads during shutdown.

A simple way to test this is the following:

sudo nano /etc/default/grub

Change this line:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"

To this:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="text"

Ctrl + O to write then Enter and Ctrl + X to close nano.

Run sudo update-grub

Reboot or poweroff (in my test it took 2 shutdowns for the text to appear but bear in mind this is a fresh install in a VM for testing and I only have Intel, no Nvidia).

On startup and shutdown you should now see text only without garbling.

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5

This solved the issue. now it’s displayed correctly. Let me know if you want me to make additional tests / changes.

It also helped me to address another issue when docking station is attached - but this is unrelated as the issue existed also when no docking was used.

Thanks

6

If you are happy with the results, then no I cannot think of any other change needed.

You might want to consider filing a bug report against the Nvidia driver if this is indeed the cause of the garbled text during shutdown.

Please mark the relevant post as the solution so the community knows this topic is solved as it let’s other users know there is a solution if they have the same issue.

Thanks.

[I see you opened a new topic for the other issue, thanks]

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7

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