I'm running a pretty stripped down version of RedHat 9.0 and would like to change the resolution so that the whole LCD display is used (that is no black border).

There is no X or anything else running, straight console.

I have looked around the web, and found a few obscure solutions, with "framebuffer" being the most common. Wasn't able to find a good write-up anywhere about how to install it.

Any recommendations how to go about this?

framebuffer is a kernel thingie...so, if your kernel doesn't have it compiled in, you'll need to recompile your kernel. you still might have it (I don't know about stock kernels, I've used a custom one for a long time now), and if you do, you need to give some options in your bootloader to use it...in grub, at least, you just append the option vga=xxx to your kernel line, where xxx is a certain number that describes the resolution and colors. these numbers (and help for lilo users) can easily be found from google, just search for framebuffer vga options or grub/lilo vga options or something..

if you put the option in your bootloader but nothing happens, then you almost surely don't have framebuffer support in your kernel...

The framebuffer is a "program" which is compiled INTO the kernel to allow direct access to video card memory. Is that correct? Based on the info I collected from all the sources.

And my next step would be to find the program and learn how to recompile kernel Right?

those are settings that are changed on the monitor itself. so i guess your monitor doesn't have those controls? weird.
anyway, svgatextmode is a program you can play with. it's not standard. you'll have to find it on the web.

Yes, it's an LCD, so it's fixed resolution. I was looking to increase the "desk space" so to speak.

Is there a way to check what is currently compiled into the kernel?

Use kernel framebuffer and pass the vga=xxx option to lilo or grub, just as b0uncer suggested.

Here are the vga options: http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Framebuffer-HOWTO-5.html under section 5.3

ie, if you want to run 800x600 at 24bit, just append vga=0x315 in lilo or grub, BUT make sure you have the framebuffer enabled, or your screen will go blank. AFAIK, RH9 out-of-the-box kernel has fb enabled by default.

Hope it helps

Actually it doesn't, I tried installing RedHat with X, then framebuffer works, but if it's a bare install without X, it throws an error when specifying higher resolution. That's why I was curious how to see what is inside the kernel at any given time.