Kernel

To get full functionality from our systems, we had to install an SMP kernel. The default non-SMP kernel only saw 1 of our 4 CPUs and 1 GB of our 4 GB of RAM.

We chose to stick with a 2.4 kernel, to be conservative, and stick with what Debian recommends.

Install the kernel headers and SMP kernel image.

# apt-get install kernel-image-2.4.27-2-686-smp kernel-headers-2.4.27-2-686-smp

The package installation also updated the GRUB configuration.

Reboot the server to load the new kernel:

# init 6

On reboot, check to see that the system sees all 4 CPUs:

$ cat /proc/cpuinfo

Check to see that 4 GB of RAM is also enabled:

$ cat /proc/meminfo

(There are several other ways to verify this information, including the top and free commands.)

We'd like to compile a custom kernel to help with a few more issues:

• Remove ACPI support, and add APM support. (Both deal power management, but our systems only support the older APM standard.)
• Remove USB and sound, as our systems do not have those features.
• Remove SymBIOS SCSI drivers, as we've got nothing attached to those controllers. (We're using the ida driver for the SmartArray 4200 RAID controller.)

See the following pages for info on packaging the kernel the Debian way:

• http://www.howtoforge.com/howto_linux_kernel_2.4_compile_debian
• http://www.howtoforge.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21
• http://www.howtoforge.com/howto_linux_kernel_2.6_compile_debian
• http://www.projektfarm.com/en/support/howto/debian_kernel_compile.html
• http://www.debian.org/doc/FAQ/ch-kernel.en.html
• http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/reference/ch-kernel.en.html
• http://newbiedoc.sourceforge.net/system/kernel-pkg.html