Req. advice on upgrades: kernel, X, libc

[Scott Bigham <dsb@killerbunnies.org>]

This is, I humbly submit, at least partially on-topic for this list, ;)
since the machine I'm thinking about upgrading is my notebook, and at
least some of the questions are laptop-specific.

Anywho, these are the upgrades I'm considering:

  - kernel:  2.2.19 -> 2.4.9

    My understanding from previous discussions on this topic is that the
    PCMCIA kernel modules in 2.4 are NRFPT (or has this changed in
    2.4.9?), and that I will therefore need to build and install the
    pcmcia-cs modules in the same manner that I did for 2.2.x, after
    which I will presumably have exactly the same PCMCIA functionality
    that I have now.

    There's also the issue of whether to compile in framebuffer support,
    in light of:

  - XFree86:  3.3.6 -> 4.1.0

    My notebook is a Toshiba Portege 7020CT, which has a NeoMagic NM2200
    video chip.  The XFree86 site lists this chip as "Support
    (accelerated)" in 4.1.0;[1] do I lose the acceleration if I use the
    framebuffer?

    There's also the question of the XF86Config changes; is there a
    utility to convert an old 3.3.6 config file to the new syntax?

    Of course, unless I want to download a ~50MB tarball and recompile
    all of X from first principles, I first have to upgrade:

  - libc6:  2.1.3 -> 2.2.3

    This is the one that's really got me worried.  I mean, if this goes
    wrong, it has the potential to break *everything*.  Anything special
    I need to do here?

    And, coming full circle, if I do this upgrade before the kernel
    upgrade, do I still need to use the "bunk" versions of the various
    2.4 utilities,[2] or can I just use the versions from testing?

TIA, as always.

						-sbigham

[1] <URL:http://www.xfree86.org/4.1.0/Status21.html#21>
[2] <URL:http://www.fs.tum.de/~bunk/kernel-24.html>