fso-console-image problems

[Mr Dash Four <mr.dash.four@googlemail.com>]

I am trying to build the above image for htcdream (MACHINE=htcdream, 
DISTRO=shr), but ran into two problems:

1. The bitbake almost finished when I got an error from 
fso-console-image.bb that "cannot satisfy the following dependencies for 
task-fso-compliance: connman-plugin-udhcp". OK, I edited the recipe for 
the task-fso-compliance recipe and deactivated this plugin (I don't plan 
to use any dhcp clients at all), then removed all traces of 
"task-fso-compliance" to force a complete rebuild of this and restarted 
bitbake. The build was successful this time.

2. I then proceeded to unpack the newly-created 
"fso-console-image-htcdream.tar" (the phone rootfs) into my 
newly-formatted smartcard (a single ext3 partition) and then did the 
same with "modules-2.6.32-*.tar" (the kernel modules). I then used 
fastboot and executed  "fastboot boot zImage-2.6.32-*.fastboot" to load 
the new kernel and boot the smartphone. The phone boots up, but the only 
thing I am seeing is a black-and-white stripes boot up screen (this is a 
splash image embedded into the kernel image) and then nothing happens at 
all.

I then tried passing various combinations of the kernel command line 
parameters via fastboot:

console=tty1 no_console_suspend=1 root=/dev/mmcblk0p1 rootdelay=8 
fbcon=rotate:1
console=tty0 no_console_suspend=1 root=/dev/mmcblk0p1 rootdelay=8 
fbcon=rotate:1
console=tty1 no_console_suspend=1 root=/dev/mmcblk0p1 rootdelay=8 
fbcon=rotate:1 nomodeset

etc etc etc, but to no avail - nothing apart from the damned 
black-and-white stripes screen just sitting there!

As a last resort I then did a complete rebuild (wiped out build/tmp and 
started from scratch with the modified recipe for task-fso-compliance to 
exclude the connman-plugin-udhcp plugin) and when it finished I repeated 
the same steps as above - nothing, exactly the same screen, NADA!

If I build shr-image all is well - the black-and-white-stripes bootup 
screen is soon replaced by the SHR logo and then I get the SHR Desktop 
after a while and I have a GUI. When I try to build "console-image" 
(similar in many ways to fso-console-image - simple cli interface), I am 
stuck also at the same step as above, but with a tiny difference - the 
black-and-white stripes screen is replaced after a short period of time 
with the OpenEmbedded logo with an empty progress bar and then I am 
stuck at this stage - nothing happens after that at all.

What am I doing wrong or am I missing something obvious here? Help is 
very much appreciated!