Linux 2.4.21 Embedded PPC 405 on Xilinx Virtex II pro is glaciarly slow

Hello,

I am running 2.4.21 on an embedded PPC 405 system, 125 MHz clock, 32 MB
SDRAM. It currently only has a UART and ttys00 is its console. It is
running the busy box monolithic binaries.  It is so slow that I have to
be cautious not to overrun the 16 byte UART 16550 input buffer. Has
anyone run into this problem before? Any ideas what might cause this or
how to troubleshoot it. I am kind of new to Linux and PPC.
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Thanks,

Andrew