In an aspect of the disclosure, a method, a computer-readable medium, and an apparatus are provided. The apparatus may be a service processor. The service processor emulates a frame buffer. The service processor determines whether the service processor is configured to generate display signals to be sent to a display based on images from the service processor or based on images from a host of the service processor. When the service processor is configured to generate the display signals based on the images from the service processor, the service processor generates a first image based on serial data received from the host through a serial port, writes the first image to the emulated frame buffer, and generates a first display signal to be sent to the display based on the first image from the emulated frame buffer.