Kernels that are used included with distributions are intended to work on as many hardware platforms as possible. This means it may include hardware drivers that are never used. With low-cost memory, this may not be much of an issue. The real issue is the lack of support for a needed feature or drivers that are interfering with one another. The more you know about your hardware, the better off you will be.
/usr/src/linux/Documentation/Configure.help
An abbreviated version of this might help. For kernel 2.2.12
this file has 11906 lines, or about 200 pages.
lilo
(LInux
LOader) documentation.
tar
command.
ftp
.
Please time this operation.
/usr/src/
/usr/src/linux
directory.
tar
the kernel source tree.
mv
(move) it to the base name of the version.
ln -s
) to it from
/usr/src/linux
/etc/lilo.conf
file and run lilo
Make sure that you have at least 5 different kernel names.
(Suggestions: original distribution, old, new, & current.
The current one should be called /vmlinuz
and be first in
the configuration file.
cd
to /usr/src/linux
.
make config
or make menuconfig
or make xconfig
.
make dep
make zlilo
or make bzlilo
Please time this operation.
make modules
& make modules_install
dmesg
for the new kernel.
ftp
download and kernel compile times