Kernel compiling questions....

[Stefan Srdic <linuxbox@telusplanet.net>]

I got the source, I've read some of the kernel documentation, now its
time to compile this thing.

I've got a few questions though. Currently I'm running Debian 2.2 with
Helix Gnome and XFree86-4.0.2. I'm running this self-modified distro on
a Asus K7M mobo with an Athlon 550Mhz cpu/128MB of RAM.

For perephirals I got a Voodoo 3 PCI, a Creative Ensoniq, 3Com Vortex
10Mbs NIC and an A-Open NE2k-pci compatible NIC (cat pci shows it as a
Realtek 8029). And I also happen to have a Maxtor ATA-66 HDD (Maxtor
92041U4) and a iOmega 2x2x24 CD-RW (ZIPCD 4x650)

My goal is to compile a kernel which performs greatly but is also very
small with only the basic requirements compiled into the kernel and
everything else compiled as modules.

So far I've decided on compiling support for my CPU (Athlon/K7), Chipset
(VIA 82C586), and primary network interface (Vortex) directly into the
kernel.  I also plan on compiling PCI and EISA PnP support along with
AGP support so that I will not have to recompile the kernel when I
upgrade some of my hardware.

I'm not sure if I should compile support for my harddrive, floppy and
CD-RW directly into the kernel or as modules. I do know that I will be
compiling support for my Voodoo 3, Ensoniq, and Realtek NIC as modules.

What should compiled directly into the kernel, and what should be
compiled into modules? Are there some modules that can be left out all
together if I'll never use that sort of hardware with Linux (ie: USB)

Thanks

Stef