How to configure Linux text console to automatically turn of the monitor after some time?

And by "text console" I mean that thing that you get on ctrl+alt+F[1-6], which is what you get whenever X11 is not running. And, no, I'm not using any framebuffer console (it's a plain, good and old 80x25 text-mode).

Many years ago, I was using Slackware Linux, and it used to boot up in text-mode. Then you would manually run startx after the login. Anyway, the main login "screen" was the plain text-mode console, and I remember that the monitor used to turn off (energy saving mode, indicated by a blinking LED) after some time.

Now I'm using Gentoo, and I have a similar setup. The machine boots up in text-mode, and only rarely I need to run startx. I say this because this is mostly my personal Linux server, and there is no need to keep X11 running all the time. (which means: I don't want to use GDM/KDM or any other graphical login screen)

But now, in this Gentoo text-mode console, the screen goes black after a while, but the monitor does not enter any energy-saving mode (the LED is always lit). Yes, I've waited long enough to verify this.

Thus, my question is: how can I configure my current system to behave like the old one? In other words, how to make the text console trigger energy-saving mode of the monitor?

(maybe I should (cross-)post this question to http://unix.stackexchange.com/ )