basic process for configuring single display

[habilis]

I've read through tutorials on xorg.conf and xrandr but I have a hard time sorting it all out.

I have two questions:

You have installed a distro and you're looking at a desktop, but its off center on the monitor and its in low graphics mode, and possibly the wrong refresh rate. [ I've been in this situation with multiple distros, but lets use Ubuntu for the example.]

1) How do you determine the actual current resolution?

2) What are the steps -in order- to configure the (single) (desktop computer) display?

[habilis]

has anyone sucessfully done this before?

[habilis]

Let me ask this:

Say you've just installed a linux operating system. (a distro)

-How do you look up, research or otherwise determine what the steps are, and what software is involved, in setting up the display (drivers, resolution, refresh rate, etc) ?

For a given OS, how/where do you learn what config files, protocols, versions, commands to use?

Lets use CentOS 4 as an example. I have no intention of installing it, and I also have no knowledge of it, -so its a perfect example.

So lets say I've just installed CentOS 4. What do I do?