Kernel 2.2 Upgrade questions

["Nadarajah, Dinesh" <Dinesh_Nadarajah@tri.sbc.com>]

I downloaded the source files for Kernel 2.2.1 from the Debian site. I
currently am running Slink (2.0.36) and was hoping to upgrade to 2.2 (good
idea???). As I was going through the configuration menus (using make
menuconfig) and found that some of the configuration options available under
slink are not there. For example "Parallel port Zip drive support". Is there
a "Kernel-HOWTO" for the new 2.2 kernel? I would like to find out what
options are available and what needs to be turned on and what to be turned
off. I also found that some of the option with regard to sound were not the
same. When I selected Sound Blaster sound card, there was no prompt or place
to enter the IRQ, DMA, etc. info. for the card. I would like to learn a
little more about the new kernel and why there is such a big difference in
configuration options.

I heard that the new kernel is very modular. Does this mean I can have a
lean mean kernel and include only the modules I need? Is SMP turned on by
default? If so would it make sense to turn it off for single processor
systems so as to get better performance?

Thanks.

-D