This looks not a QEMU bug to me. You may drop "-curses" first, and run again. Once get inside, change grub file(/etc/default/grub) by uncomment GRUB_TERMINAL=console. It should work then. If still not, then blacklist vga16fb and add "fbcon=map:99 text" in grub command line. Remember to run update-grub after change configure file.
-- You received this bug notification because you are a member of qemu- devel-ml, which is subscribed to QEMU. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1736042 Title: qemu-system-x86_64 does not boot image reliably Status in QEMU: New Bug description: Booting image as root user with following command works randomly. ./qemu-system-x86_64 -enable-kvm -curses -smp cpus=4 -m 8192 /root/ructfe2917_g.qcow2 Most of the time it ends up on "800x600 Graphic mode"(been stuck there even for 4 hours before killed), but 1 out of ~20 it boots image correctly(and instantly). This is visible in v2.5.0 build from sources, v2.5.0 from Ubuntu Xenial and v2.1.2 from Debian Jessie. The image in question was converted from vmdk using: qemu-img convert -O qcow2 file.vmdk file.qcow2 The image contains Ubuntu with grub. I can provide debug logs, but will need guidance how to enable them(and what logs are necessary). As a side note, it seems that booting is more certain after connecting(or mounting) partition using qemu-nbd/mount. To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/qemu/+bug/1736042/+subscriptions
