Sorry for the long post!

Okay, so I've been trying to find my feet in Linux. After experimenting with an endless list of distros, and reading more README and INSTALL files than I believed could exist (even as a DOS veteran) I've found myself leaning more towards Slack. I've been having a few problems, and I have a few questions, so I'm gonna try to get it all out at once.

Problems:

Although I have sucessfully compiled and booted a 2.4.21 kernel in Slack, it leaves me with some nagging issues. The main one being the system stuttering periodically, maybe every 10-15 seconds. I don't know if this is happening in the console, but it's very noticable in KDE.

I still can't get my head around all the options in menuconfig. I can never seem to find the right balance of stuff I need, and stuff I don't. I want to get the kernel down to the essentials, but every time I take out one option, it seem to mess up something else. Can someone help me make more sense of it?

I've had absolutely no luck with retaining the nice high resolution consoles that slack offers during install with any of my compiled kernels.

I'm sure I've had about a million other problems, but those are the ones that spring to mind.

Questions:

Am I right in assuming that the kernel image can be called whatever you want, so long as LILO can find it?

After compiling a new kernel, are there any changes I have to make to the config of my system (other than LILO)? For example, XFree86, KDE, etc.

When should I install a module instead of compiling straight into the kernel?

I remember during the Gentoo installation process there was a point where you could edit a config file somewhere, which would cause all future compiles to specifically compile for a certain chip architecture. In my case, Athlon XP, as opposed to just Athlon. Is there a way to set this in Slack, and more importantly, is it worth it?

Gentoo also had that rather nifty "emerge" utility, whereby just typing "emerge such-and-such" would download and compile the package and all dependencies. Is there a way of using this utility in Slack, or is there some kind of alternative?

Many thanks in advance,

Bawbag.

bawbag: When I compiled my first kernel, I had the same problems/questions as you have now. There is an enormous amount of documentation on compiling the kernel.

Did you look at the kernel-HOWTO on this forum? My first few attempts at compiling the kernel didn't work too well, but you learn as you go. As your compiling and making selections, take notes of the choices you made and eventually you will get it right(grin).

Best of luck, BC