At last, after an extenuating series of failures I've been able to compile a tailored 2.4.9 kernel for my laptop under debian potato, using many of the options I had been using when compiling the 2.2.19 one.
Now, it happens that while my 2.2.19 kernel at boot time recognizes the eth0 card (an eepro100, built as a module) and I can issue either ifconfig or ifup without problem, the new 2.4 kernel doesn't seem to recognize it (compiled as a module) giving the following well known error: potato#ifconfig eth0 192.168.1.1 SIOCSIFADDR:no such device eth0:unknown interface:no such device If I issue 'modprobe eepro100' 'ifconfig' works properly but 'ifup eth0' goes on failing saying: ifup: interface eth0 already configured As a further check (but I don't know if it is relevant!),in /var/log/messages I find the following: <snip> PCI: PCI BIOS revision 2.10 entry at 0xf0478, last bus=1 PCI: Using configuration type 1 PCI: Probing PCI hardware Unknown bridge resource 2: assuming transparent PCI: Discovered primary peer bus 04 [IRQ] PCI: Using IRQ router PIIX [8086/7110] at 00:07.0 Limiting direct PCI/PCI transfers. <snip> And issuing lspci I get: 00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX - 82443BX/ZX Host bridge (rev 03) 00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX - 82443BX/ZX AGP bridge (rev 03) 00:04.0 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1225 (rev 01) 00:04.1 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1225 (rev 01) 00:07.0 Bridge: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 ISA (rev 02) 00:07.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 IDE (rev 01) 00:07.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 USB (rev 01) 00:07.3 Bridge: Intel Corporation 82371AB PIIX4 ACPI (rev 03) 00:08.0 Multimedia audio controller: ESS Technology ES1978 Maestro Audiodrive (rev 10) 00:09.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82557 [Ethernet Pro 100] (rev 09) 00:09.1 Serial controller: Lucent Microelectronics: Unknown device 0445 01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc 3D Rage P/M Mobility AGP 2x (rev 64) Vittorio