Hi,
follow the steps:
cd /usr/src/linux-2.4/
make xconfig
and then changed the config to your needs and then
make clean && make dep && make && make bzImage &&
make modules &&
make modules_install && make install
this line use to work with my 7.1 box but it wont work with 8.
Copy the new kernel from /usr/src/linux <version>/arch/i386/.... to /boot/ & modify the grub.conf or lilo.conf (whatever u have) & reboot the system..
Regds,
santosh