Why don't you use your dads laptop screen to set up the hard drive, then when thats ok you can concentrate on the monitor.
When the hard drive is set up correctly, it should find the tft automatically and install the correct drivers
Or have I missed somthing
EDIT: Yep clearly I have. Thought you could use the laptop monitor to sort your PC, but realised you tried the TFT with the laptop - sorry - its too early!
DJ