the eternal video driver problem

[Toppinfo@xxxxxxx]

hi all stateside.  from sunny  but damn cold  the south of france

just changed computers  and on installing REDhat 5.1  all
seems ok   but after a lot of meesing on with video setup
ie Xconfigurator   etc   i finally got it to sort of work

but!!!   there is always a but   no?

it refuses  to start  in anything  but standard mode (to start with only 8pp)
but that i solved it goes fine in 16pp now   however  still cant get it
to do  800x600   every time it try to start video server in 800x600
all i get is a black screen  same thing  if you start in normal  when
you use ctrl-alt +   to change mode  black screen again
system dont crash though  cos another ctrl-alt +  up lights screen
and all is ok

what is it   maybe it kicks the card into power save mode or something
if so  will i have to reompile the kernal  without   power management
or what

techy  details   
 vid card        diamond stealth 32 pci  2mb  from about 1995
 linux serv      XVGA    
  vid chips       tseng  ET4000wp
mother board   triton  pci                          from about 1995

it needs linear mode on all accel modes  so it only  uses 1mb of vid mem
but i know thats not the problem
  salut  a tous
                            steve topp