Ok, I've heard lots of people talking about "Recompiling the Kernel". Whats that do? Why's it done? Sorry, I'm an ultra-newbie, which is why i'm posting here

-Direwolf

When you compile a kernel, you start off with the kernel source code - in C, which is a programming language understandable by humans, and you run a series of programs including gcc, the C compiler, to process that source code and create an executuable program.

The kernel, BTW is the core program in the operating system that starts at boot and manages your hardware and your programs. This is Linux itself, all the other packages are software that runs in Linux.

Generally, recompiling the kernel is done to create a customized kernel with the drivers and options you want, which can improve performance and give you options that aren't available with kernels shipped with distros like Red Hat.

Ohh, I think i got you . So basically "Don't touch it until you're good at what you're doing"

-Direwolf