I've just about got Mdk 8.0 up and running but... I can't find a kernel .config file that corresponds to the new installation so I can make a couple of minor changes without trashing my system. I also plan to use this for a make oldconfig on the new 2.4.9 kernel I've just downloaded. If this goes to plan, will my existing system config files carry over to the new kernel at boot-up?
I've installed xsane and successfully got my Epson 1200 USB scanner working - sometimes! It's fine if the device is turned on at boot time and briefly functioned as hot-pluggable. Since then I have not re-compiled my kernel or installed any kernel RPMs but I have installed countless other RPMs. Any suggestions how I can always be hot-pluggable?
Finally the gphoto2 website says that my Fuji FInePix 40i camera should be supported by kernels > 2.4.7 (USB as a mass-storage device - same as a Casio camera) any idea which kernel parameters need config'ing?

Take a look at /boot/config-<version>. Pretty sure that's your oldconfig. One thing, if you go from fstab with supermount and boot a kernel that does not support supermount, fstab gets modified to reflect that supermount is disabled. If you boot back to the supermount kernel, I think you have to do # supermount -i enable to get it back. There's some stuff at MUO about supermount. Make and install your new kernel, modules, and initrd, if needed, add the entry to grub or lilo, and keep the old kernel for a safety net. I think the bulk of the configuration files don't get modified by the new kernel and this can cause some errors if modules change, etc. That's what I think. HTH.