Kernel Woes.......................

[NicZak]

Okay..im going nuts here ... I am simply trying to configure/install a new kernel (2.4.16) so I unpack it to /usr/src/linux-2.4.16, then enter that dir, do a 'make mrproper' then 'make menuconfig', configure all the kernel options, 'make dep', 'make clean', 'make bzImage', 'make modules', 'make modules_install', 'mkinitrd /boot/initrd-2.4.16.img 2.4.6' (this has given me an error saying all loopback devices are in use), 'make install' (gives error about no /etc/lilo.conf (makes sense grub is default bootloader)) and finally cp /usr/src/linux-2.4.16/arch/i386/boot/bzImage /boot/bz-2.4.16, edit /boot/grub/grub.conf, reboot and ... I get a msg saying ext3 is not supported, and after I login lsmod gives me an empty list and I can't install any modules (or new ones i.e. nvidia).. Where did I go wrong!?

[furrycat]

First thing to note is that it's very important that /usr/src/linux always point to your latest kernel source. So

ln -s linux-2.4.16 /usr/src/linux

after moving the old linux out of the way if necessary.

Once that's done you'll be able to recompile your nVidia stuff and other 3rd-party modules. These things need to be rebuilt when you make a new kernel, and they expect /usr/src/linux to contain the include files for the running kernel.

If it says ext3 isn't supported you probably have an ext3 filesystem but didn't compile in support for it. Reconfigure your kernel with ext3 either statically in or as a module. If your root filesystem is supposed to be ext3 it will of course need to be static.