Okay, so I solved my problem.

It took several re-installs and just an absolute mountain of time but I finally figured it out.

For me, having GZIP enabled prevented the product from working. As soon as I turned it off - bam! it works instantly.

I figured I'd post my solution in case anyone encounters this.

Hi thanks for this just had exactly the same problem with same solution

Hi it appears that with GZIP enabled, admin functions for grid dont work, display nearly works, but page information goes in to a vertical list instead of horizontal list

So it doesnt really seem that this isuse is solved, all we have here is a work around.

Grid should be able to function with gzip enabled imo