This is in regard to both Debian and Fedora installer developers:

(and no I am NOT trolling)

What the HECK are you guys thinking, going with the 2.4.x kernel during the install process? If I want to install on a new (e.g., i9x5 chipset - replace x by various numbers) chipset, the installer cannot recognize drives using the integral controllers (I have to put an SI or Promise controller in. WTF?). The integral Intel Extreme (which admittedly stands for Extremely Painfully Slow) display chipset is unsupported by the chipset, and Fedora Core won't even boot into console mode - I get a kernel panic halfway through the kernel initialization when attempting to boot from CD-ROM.

Why oh why did you base the installers on old kernels?

I had to rant.

It's probably because 2.6 series kernels don't fit inside 1.44MB floppy disk images (as used to make El Torito bootable CDs).

Dave

Don't have a clue, but is there a boot option to specify a newer kernel?

Back when the change was happening, I seem to remember Gentoo using the smp option. If you specified you have an smp setup, an smp kernel was loaded, which happen to be a 2.6.x kernel. Or maybe I dreamed it...

Cool

for debian you just have to type linux26 at the boot prompt. i made the same mistake the first time, it wouldn't recognize my sata drives. for slackware i still haven't gotten it installed because i can't get it to boot off the 2.6 kernel.

Thanks jnev, I'll try that. I still think defaulting to 2.4 is silly though, given that the i8xx series chipset have gone the way of the dodo. Any (well, most) new Intel-based PCs are going to be i9xx based.