problems with 2.4.18 & networking

[Net Llama]

I just built 2.4.18 on a HP Omnibook XE2 laptop running Redhat-7.2. 
Everything is working perfectly using the Redhat supplied kernel.  

Networking is severely horked using the 2.4.18 kernel that i built (this
is the first kernel that i've built on this laptop, so i'm not ruling
out the possibility of my unfamiliarity with the hardware).  Here's an
assortment of errors that i'm seeing at bootup:

ifup: arping: socket: Address family not supported by protocol
ifup: Error, some other host already uses address 127.0.0.1
network: bringing up interface lo: failed
RTNETLINK answers: Cannot assign requested address

What is even more strange is that the loopback comes up anyway (it
appears in the output from ifconfig).  I'll also note that support for
the PCMCIA Xircom RealPort Cardbus Ethernet 10/100+ Modem 56 card no
longer seems to exist, as pcmcia-cs fails to recognize it, even when i
manually load the module that supports it.  

After trolling through messages a bit, I see some references to a
failure to locate module net-pf-17 when cardmgr tries to support the
card.  What I don't understand is why its looking for the packet socket
module, when i have no call for it in modules.conf.  

Any & all input on this weirdness is appreciated.  Thanks!

=====
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lonni J. Friedman                     netllama at linux-sxs.org

Linux Step-by-step help:           http://netllama.ipfox.com

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