I use the Kernel the One Shipped With the Distribution. We can tune some kernel parameters at later state to resolve any performance issues. -srao01

I use the Kernel the One Shipped With the Distribution. We can tune some kernel parameters at later state to resolve any performance issues. -srao01

Actually, there isn't any difference to the drivers - other than how many, and which ones are compiled into the kernel statically... The stock kernels are generic and with a minimum of drivers (display, keyboard one memory resident filesystem). After that, any needed drivers are loaded from the memory resident filesystem (from the initrd).

The only "speed" improvement would having your specific device drivers/filesystems loaded into the kernel at compile time. It can speed up boot by skipping the initrd.

Of course, that also means it is less likely that your kernel will work if you have to replace your motherboard...

I use the kernel shipped with my distribution.

I am curious about the people that chose "other" on the poll are using for a kernel?

rooolling release mine is always kept updated Void Linux ....

There is no real need anymore

Why bother the stock kernels are fine no need to compile anymore unless you are doing something specific that requires it.

I chose "other" because at any time I may be running either two different Debian-supplied kernels, one Debian-supplied and one compiled from kernel.org or two compiled form kernel.org.
I agree with the previous posts that compiling a kernel isn't something to be done to allow better performance, at least on the type of hardware I run, but sometimes the touchpad on my laptop or the NVIDIA driver on my desktop run better with one kernel than another so I still compile sometimes.

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I guess I just got in the habit way back in the 90's. It doesn't hurt, and 90% of the time I've got some oddball thing or other I need to tweak.

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one of the problems with running the generic kernel is that SOMETIMES, it won't work with other parts of your system.

In my case, that turned out to be the changes in the VM support - unless the other projects (Xen/kvm/libvirtd) are in sync with the kernel, they didn't work.

MOST things are fine. But sometimes things will get out of whack.

I started using Linux in 1993, at which time everyone pretty much compiled the kernel. I've compiled the kernel probably hundreds of times -- but not for a number of years. These days I use the kernel that comes with my distribution.

Thanks 273 for the response, it makes sense why you chose other.

I always use the one that ships with distro or otherwise whatever one ends up getting installed/updated when I do yum/apt-get update.

Eventually I'd like to learn more about the inner workings of Linux and perhaps compile all my own system, but never really have time. I've gone through the LFS book, I'd like to actually build such system one day.

I am still real new to linux (mint 17.3 x64 Mate) and am not quite sure what "compile means"
But i do download and install newer kernels as I upgrade hardware or other things . I am up to Kernel 4.2.5 in one machine and have stayed there for a number of months. but in a slightly newer one i've gone to 4.4.something. I did those moves to try to improve performance of a few things I had installed and it worked just great. but, in another machine, my older laptop i have stayed at 3.19.63 maybe, forget the exact last 2digits. it came with 3.16. something. it works fine but saw no need to change anything at all.

the other 2 were experiencing a couple of issues with some software operations and other glitches . i followed a few links to the kernel upgrade information in the standard newbie sites. so backed up and did the step by step kernel upgrade process. worked ,so was happy i gave it a shot. Even though I did not really have much of a clue as to what i was doing the first time. just crossed my fingers at the first few reboots and hoped for the best.
..I actually compiled step by step, copy/paste once
I used an application kernelupdate once,immediately took it out of my startup though.was more than I wanted in terms up update/upgrades.
I used the Mint Mate Update Manager the last 2 upgrades from 3.19 to 4.2 in one machine. worked fine so far.
I liked being able to compile it myself, but took more time and was a little over my head and found the update manager-->view--> Linux Kernel simple and fast without any mistakes.
kernelupdate app was ok but got me an error or 2 on one machine.but did work on a "prn" basis once i took it out of the start up list, not as well or easy,rather, than the update manager method.