John Check <j4strngs(a)bitless.net> wrote: Tell it to build binary packages, include the relevant flags to emerge to say "use binaries if you got 'em", and downgrades are almost as fast as rpm/deb systems. I love having the source archives to hand when I want to make changes - sure, not everyone wants this, and gentoo might not be suitable for them... and getting the source isn't always that difficult... but if you've ever been severed from the internet and want to change or fix or just look at a bit of code on your running system, chances are that it's in /var/distfiles ready to be used. I might carry around a Knoppix CD for luck, but Gentoo has a permanent home on every one of my computers. emerge is dead slow on anything less than a P-III though - especially searching and the last stage of a sync (index regeneration or whatever it is). Got a P-II that takes about ten minutes after the last bit of data has rsync'ed across before the prompt comes back. Compilation time is even longer? Sure, but I'd expect that. I don't expect the package manager to waste valuable compilation CPU cycles :) (no, it's not a big problem. yes, one day I'll even try rewriting portage in C if no one else has) TM