The following reply was made to PR port-alpha/34446; it has been noted by GNATS.

From: Pavel Cahyna <pavel@NetBSD.org>
To: gnats-bugs@NetBSD.org
Cc: 
Subject: Re: port-alpha/34446 (4.0_BETA kernel panics on Alpha during boot)
Date: Wed, 12 Dec 2007 23:59:01 +0100

 >  I had COPTS=-pipe and CPUFLAGS=-mcpu=ev56; I was able to compile and boot an 
 >  RC3 kernel when removing both options, but as my server has given up the 
 >  ghost, I haven't been able to ascertain which option (or possibly both) 
 >  caused the error.
 
 The first; as mk.conf(5) man page says, COPTS should be appended to,
 rather than explicitly set. I am going to close the PR.