hwr@pilhuhn.de said:
> Just put "Option power_saver" in the right place in XF86Config. 

From looking at the source, this switches off the sync signals.
A minimal subset (2 states only) could be easily implemented
in the generic VGA wscons driver. and be mase available through
an ioctl.
There is however no screensaver framework within wscons, so
the display would not go off or on automatically.

[APM switches display off]
> I have no option to specify this in the bios and as it looks, I can
> also not do this from apm(8).

In the "power" menu of my Thinkpad's setup is an item
"LCD off timer".
There is also an APM "device id" for the display. I'd assume
this will only work with onboard graphics.
The apm driver doesn't support this well at the moment.

best regards
Matthias