Weblog entry #3 for Romeo
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On my PC I have a 2.4.27-2-686 kernel installed now (for two last years, since the Sarge had been released). System is 3.1r2 without any updates.
This box is rather old and outdated because it is powered by Intel Mendocino CPU (at 400 MHz), 192 MB of system memory (it works as PC66) and AGP1 card (3Dfx Banshee with 16 Mb of memory).
Debian is the good choice for such kind of machines because it provides more long life for them. And I can say that my PC works good although it's not a champion. :-)
So, my question is in this.
What are the reasons to migrate on 2.6.x kernels? I mean that 2.4.x kernels will be out of support soon (may be in Etch, I don't know exactly).
What kernels are better — 2.4.x or 2.6.x — in comparison with the performance, stability and security in mind?
Thank you.
Comments on this Entry
[ Send Message | View Steve's Scratchpad | View Weblogs ]
2.6.x feels faster to me on my hardware, it also has better support for many things which is a plus. But I guess on older hardware you're already fully supported.
I'd suggest you try it and see how it works reverting if there is no improvement. I'd expect 2.6.x would use less memory and be more responsive, but it is hard to tell.
If nothing else there is better security in the newer kernels, despite a fair number of bugs found early on.
[ Parent | Reply to this comment ]
Thank you for your answer, Steve.
Probably I'll try it. Nice to read that 2.6.x uses less memory. Though I think it will set me thinking about some things like start scripts and drivers, including ALSA. AFAIK modules for ALSA are already included into the 2.6.x kernel images, but I had never used such kernels, so I don't know their specific features.
In my Debian distribution there are several kernels included. For example, 'kernel-image-2.6.8-2-686_2.6.8-16sarge1_i386.deb' package, that is about one year old. It seems to me that such kernels are well tested to use them every day, am I right?
Thank you again.
P. S.
There must be 'em-dash' instead of some ugly letters in my previous post.
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[ Send Message | View Steve's Scratchpad | View Weblogs ]
Yes such kernels have been tested extensively by all the current users.
[ Parent | Reply to this comment ]
Btw it is a good choiche to try it out. Consider that the amount of new hardware supported is really big, ando also tons of features that probably you'll not need.
So maybe you will "need" to recompile it.
Have a lot of fun... :-)
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