Justin Piszcz wrote:

I (normally) do not run -rcX release and I always compile in RAID 
support and have not seen that issue; then again, I did not try 
2.6.19-rc5 that I can remember.

I've just discovered the problem (at 1 am of course).

I'm using Linux with my own custom kernel running on a quad Mac Pro (no 
Parallels, no Bootcamp, no Windows, no OS X etc, and hence no partition 
restrictions.....:-). Since this is an Intel Mac, running grub used to 
be a bit tricky owing to the A20 line problem, so I've been using lilo 
instead.
After building the kernel, I dutifully typed the following, as any good 
lilo believing kernel builder should:

lilo

This ended up placing the boot block on the root partition. I had 
previously told the Mac EFI boot loader to look for it on the MBR of my 
first SATA drive, which in this case is a very different location. What 
I should have used was:

lilo -b /dev/sda

It was booting the old kernel of course, which was the same version 
release as the rebuilt one.

(....slapping forehead.....)

All is working just as expected now.....:-)

Many Thanks for your comments........