Since you threw down the gauntlet so to
speak, I provide here my config for purposes
of comparison -

To recap - my system here (as well as systems
at work and various clients are very stable with
2.4.16, with the exception of some misadventures
mixing incompatible patches)

The architectures vary somewhat, but I tend to
use similar configs on all boxes.

All my systems are redhat, mostly 7.1, w/ updates

I generally use ext2 everywhere.

Using gcc-2.96 of course

lspci output
--------------------
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 82815 815 Chipset Host Bridge and
Memory Controller Hub (rev 02)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation: Unknown device 1131 (rev 02)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset PCI
(rev 02)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset ISA
Bridge (ICH2) (rev 02)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset
IDE U100 (rev 02)
00:1f.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset
USB (Hub A) (rev 02)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset SMBus (rev
02)
00:1f.4 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82820 820 (Camino 2) Chipset
USB (Hub B) (rev 02)
01:08.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82820 820 (Camino 2)
Chipset Ethernet (rev 01)
01:0b.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82557 [Ethernet Pro 100]
(rev 08)
01:0d.0 Multimedia audio controller: Ensoniq ES1371 [AudioPCI-97] (rev
06)
02:00.0 VGA compatible controller: 3Dfx Interactive, Inc. Voodoo 3 (rev
01)

kernel config attached -