On Mon, 9 Aug 1999, David Brownlee wrote:

> 	egcs with -O2 really tries hard to optimise the kernel.
> http://www.netbsd.org/Documentation/kernel/index.html#kernel-compile-slow
> 	suggests using "make COPTS=-O" to save time, though it may make
> 	most sense to find an old pentium or even 486 on which you can
> 	compile :)
>
> On Mon, 9 Aug 1999, Steven Grunza wrote:
> 
> > It worked great.  The only problem now is that I can't reasonably 
> > build a kernel.  I've got 8 MB of RAM and a 386SX.  I let the system 
> > run (without X running) for two days but the new kernel still wasn't 
> > finished building.  I seem to recall this machine took a long time to 
> > build a new kernel but that an overnight run (8 hours or so) was all 
> > that was needed.

> > 	- 386SX-25
> > 	- 8MB RAM
> > 	- 6.4 GB disk (56 MB swap)

It could be that 1.4 GENERIC has grown a little fat. I once built a
kernel while booted from the INSTALL kernel (of necessity). Maybe that
would give you a little more real memory to work with. "boot
netbsd-install -as", to specify your root device (not the ramdisk!),
mount the partitions by hand, and so on.

FWIW, it only takes about 1/2 hr to build a custom kernel on a
486DX4-48mb, and it never comes close to using all 48.