Entering the Console

The console gives you direct keyboard and video access to your server, even when networking is broken or the OS won't fully boot. For VPS-class products it's a browser-based noVNC window that opens in a new tab. For dedicated servers it's a remote KVM session from the data centre's management agent - same idea, different plumbing.

• For VPS-class servers, the VM must be running. The Console button is disabled when it's stopped - start it first from the power controls.
• Your browser must allow pop-ups for the portal domain - the console opens in a new tab (or, for dedicated, a sized pop-up window).
• Power and console actions require Write access to the resource. Read-only roles can see the buttons but can't open the console.

1. In the sidebar, click Cloud (or GPU Cloud / VDS, depending on which product you want to reach).

2. Click the row for the server. The detail page opens at /vps/{id} with the status pill in the header and a row of icons in the top-right toolbar.

1. In the top-right toolbar, the Console button is the leftmost icon - a small screen icon.
2. Click Console. A new browser tab opens at /console/vps/{id} with a noVNC session connected to the running VM.

Inside the noVNC tab you can:

• Type directly into the console.
• Paste from your clipboard via the noVNC sidebar (the small chevron on the left edge of the noVNC window).
• Send Ctrl+Alt+Del and other special key combos from the noVNC toolbar - these would otherwise be eaten by your local OS.

If you recently changed the Console Display in Settings from Serial to VGA (or back) and haven't power-cycled yet, the portal shows a small dialog before opening the console:

Three options:

• Power cycle and open: recommended. Restarts the VM and opens the console once the new display backend is live.
• Open anyway: opens the console immediately with the old display. You'll see the previous backend until the next reboot.
• Cancel: closes the dialog without opening the console.

For VPS-class servers, the Settings tab has a Console Display section near the top. You'll see two buttons:

• Serial (serial0): text-only console. Best for Linux cloud-init installs and headless debugging. Lower bandwidth, copy/paste-friendly.
• Standard VGA: full graphical framebuffer. Required for Windows and for any graphical installer that paints pixels.

Switching the display backend requires a power cycle - the portal flags this with a yellow Reboot required banner at the top of the page. Click Reboot now in the banner once you've made the change.

The dedicated-server console is a vendor-specific KVM session, not a noVNC tab.

1. In the sidebar, click Metal. Click the row for the dedicated server. The detail page opens at /metal/{id}.
2. There are two places to launch the KVM session - both work:

   1. From the toolbar: click the KVM button in the top-right.
   2. From the Management tab: click the Management tab in the tab row, then click Open KVM Console.

A pop-up window opens at 1280×900 with a launch URL provided by the location's remote-management agent - typically a vendor-specific IPMI, iKVM, or Redfish viewer. You'll see BIOS, POST output, and the OS boot console, depending on the server's current state.

If the KVM button is greyed out, hover over it - the tooltip explains why (usually that the location agent is offline). Open a Support ticket if it stays offline.

• Opening a console does not change the VM's power state on its own. If you can't see anything, check the status pill - a stopped VM has nothing to draw.
• VNC and KVM sessions are logged on the Activity tab with the actor and timestamp. Closing the tab ends the session.
• Display backend changes (Serial / VGA) take effect on the next full power cycle, not on a soft reboot.