First off, Luke and Troy, I'd like to thank you for your responses.  Having
to re-install SL delayed my reply a bit.  I'll make a couple of comments on
that, then describe the output I got for the suggested commands.

At the beginning of the install was text saying the hardware found was:
    video card: 3D Permedia (generic)
    monitor:    Unknown
    mouse:      2-button (generic)

Actually, my 'mouse' is a 3-button Alps Glidepoint touchpad, and was un-
usable during the install.  After the installation, it worked fine.

[ As an aside, during the installation, on the INSTALLATION TYPE screen,
the NEXT button is mostly hidden on a 'sheet' behind the visible screen. ]

On the first SL boot after the install, date, time, and display needed to
be specified.  For 'Display', both the monitor and the video card could be
'configured'.  For the latter I successfully entered 'ELSA Gloria Synergy'.
When I pressed 'configure' for the monitor, I was presented with a list of
brands, and I could highlight a brand, Hitachi in my case.  But the 'OK'
button stayed grayed out, and double-clicking did nothing.  The 'Cancel'
button worked fine, but that's it.  In fact, _none_ of the brands could
actually be selected: for every one the 'OK' button was grayed out.

After a second re-boot I invoked 'system-config-display' from the command
line, and found the video card selected as above, but again could select no
monitor brand, just as above.  The monitor stayed an 'Unknown', which is
probably why the rsolution choices stayed at 640x480 or 800x600, and the
color at 256 colors.
                     __________________________________

In response to specific questions:

Luke Scharf <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Dushan Mitrovich wrote:
>> The card is an Elsa Gloria Synergy, with 4 MB of RAM.
>>
> That's an unusual card.  I remember having a few with a similar name a
> long time ago, in a far-far away corner of the campus.
>
> Do you know which chipset the card uses?

Unfortunately, no, I don't.

> The rest of the machine sounds normal -- for an older Workstation-class
> PC.  Shouldn't cause a modern Linux any consternation.
>
>> Is there a way to invoke "system-config-display" during the install
>> phase?
>
> The installer is supposed to lead you through it, but I almost always
> have to reconfigure the monitor when I deliver the machine (and attach
> it to it's real monitor).  Also, if you used the text installer, or if
> it's guestimate of your configuration was wrong, it might have just
> skipped that step.
>
> One other thing that you'll want to know is that once
> system-config-display has been run, you can do some real tweaking by
> logging in on a text-console as root, shutting down the graphics by
> changing runlevel 3 ("init 3"), and editing /etc/X11/xorg.conf with Your
> Favorite Text Editor.  (Try nano if you don't have one; I use and love
> vim, but learning it is painful).  You can test the new config-file by
> typing "X" on the command-line.  This method can be irritating, but by
> using system-config-display in conjunction with editing
> /etc/X11/xorg.conf, you can hit what I think is the sweet spot between
> ease-of-use, power-of-configuration, and irritating-time-sink.

I'll try the 'nano' text editor, since 'Boxer' isn't available for Linux.

                     __________________________________

Troy Dawson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Can you send the output of the command
>
>    lspci | grep -i VGA

Yes, here it is:
  VGA compatible controller: Texas Instruments TVP4020 [Permedia 2] (rev 11)

> I'm just curious what it says for a video card.  As for changing the
> resolution, you should run system-config-display.
> You can start it by typeing system-config-display at the command line, or
> select "System Settings -> Display" from the menu.  Then go to the 'Hard-
> ware' tab, select 'Monitor Type'

That's what I was unable to do.  See above.

> Now you didn't mention is this is a flat panel, or a normal monitor.  I
> looked and Hitachi SuperScan 812 isn't in the list of known monitors.

It's actual model number is Hitachi CM812, and it's a CRT.

>                                                                       You
> can try 'Generic CRT Display' if this is a normal monitor, or 'Generic
> LCD Display' if it is a flat panel.

Couldn't select 'Generic CRT Display' either; I tried.

> Then under that select 'Monitor 1280x1024' or 'LCD Panel 1280x1024'.
> After clicking OK, on the monitor section, then go back to the 'Settings'
> tag, and you should then be able to select 1280x1024.

Looks like this'll have to wait until the first problem is solved.

> Two other questions:
>
> - In the boot choices offered by GRUB, the selection line has a black back-
>   ground, and the screen background is almost all black, making the selec-
>   ted line almost impossible to see.  Is there a way of modifying this?

> Two way's to do this.
> 1) Edit /boot/grub/grub.conf and comment out the line starting with
> splashimage, I also tend to comment out the line hiddenmenu so that
> things looke like
>
>     default=0
>     timeout=5
>     #splashimage=(hd0,0)/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz
>     #hiddenmenu
>
> That will give you a text based grub command, which is white letters on
> black, pretty easy to see

Yes, that's what I'll try when I get past the first hurdle.

> 2) Get an image and replace /boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz
> It has to be a gzipped xpm file.  I personally think step 1 is easier.
>
> > - After booting, and invoking LVM (needs password), a window appears
> >   and immediately disappears.  What gives?
>
> What do you mean by "invoking LVM"?
> Are you selecting something from the menu?  Or are you typing in a
> command?
>
> If you are selecting it from the menu, then try typing
>
>     system-config-lvm
>
> from the command line, and let us know what the error is when it stops.

For this too, I'll wait for the next stage.

Any ideas about how to get past the monitor selection problem?

- Dushan Mitrovich