This problem occours when creating a new table. When
editing the field definitions, choose a collation for
the table from the dropdown box. Now, add more fields
to the panel and phpMyAdmin will forget the collation
choice you've just made.
I encounter this problem with the latest CVS version of
phpMyAdmin, but I'm pretty sure that the bug is also in
2.6.0.
Apache 2.0.52
php 5.0.2
MySQL 4.1.7
phpMyAdmin 2.6.1-dev
Logged In: YES
user_id=210714
fixed in cvs