[TriLUG] Kernel slowdown

[Scott]

I just upgraded my kernel from 2.4.7-10 (RedHat) to 2.4.17.  When I 
didn that, I noticed that my system slowed down substantially.  This 
got me curious (being the scientist that I am), so I decided to try 
Robert Love's 'fully pre-emptable kernel patch' with 2.4.17.  Then I 
did some testing.  My test was simple...both versions of 2.4.17 were 
monolithic (no modules) and used the same .config file to compile, 
while the RedHat stock, of course, used modules.  I decided to to test 
the amount of time it took to delete the untarred/uncompressed Linux 
source directory.  The vanilla 2.4.17 kernel took approx 28s, while 
2.4.17-preempt and 2.4.7-10 both took approx 13s.  However, the time 
slowed considerably in the 2.4.17-preempt kernel (approx 19s) if I had 
XMMS playing at the same time as deleting the Linux directory (not 
surprising).  The problem is that the XMMS started to skip.  So bad, in 
fact, that it became quite useless.

These quick and dirty tests seem to point to several possible reasons 
for a slow down: 1) The stock RedHat kernel has several patches in it 
that are streamlined specifically for the RedHat distro (if so, what 
are they) 2) I've compiled in something to both the 2.4.17 kernels that 
really slows down my machine (if so, what could that be) 3) It's the 
fact that I'm using a strictly monolithic kernel while 2.4.7-10 is 
modular (I thought modules slowed things down, not the other way 
around) 4) 2.4.17 sucks (it's Linux, how could that be?)

I'm curious so see if there is a general slowdown of the kernel (using 
my VERY limited test) over the previous 10 releases (11 and 15 
excluded) or if this is a new thing...or if I've somehow accidently 
eaten a mushroom I wasn't supposed to and I'm hallucinating...or I'm 
stupid and can't compile a kernel for doggy poopie.

So here comes the question section: 1) Has anyone else noticed this? 2) 
What could cause it?  3) How could I fix it?  4) What is the airspeed 
velocity of an unladened swallow?

Scott "Biogod" Kennedy