After a lot of cursing on debian and moving back to Arch Linux I did some research to figure out why the HDMI didn't work after u-boot. It turns out that the kernel was messed up to fix some issue with the boot on some cubieboards. The support for the display is no longer compiled into the kernel.
To get a display you would need to have the kernel compiled with this. Now the kernel is compile with those as modules instead of being compiled into the kernel.
CONFIG_FB_SUNXI=y
CONFIG_FB_SUNXI_LCD=y
CONFIG_FB_SUNXI_HDMI=y
CONFIG_FRAMEBUFFER_CONSOLE=y
CONFIG_FONT_8x8=y
CONFIG_FONT_8x16=y
A work around solution for this bug is to create a file stored on /lib/modules-load.d/ that has the modules you need. Take note that the order is very important
I called my file mali.conf and it contains this :
fbcon
lcd
hdmi
disp
disp_ump
ump
mali
Now for bug number 2
The display defaults to an unacceptable low resolution.
The solution here is to fix boot.scr
You just need to change one line in boot.txt and then create the boot.scr file
Change
setenv bootargs console=${console} root=PARTUUID=${uuid} rw rootwait
to
setenv bootargs console=${console} disp.screen0_output_mode=1920x1080p60 root=PARTUUID=${uuid} rw rootwait
To create the new file you do this :
./mkscr boot.txt
Now you reboot and after a bit a decent sized login prompt shows up.
Michel