For the most part, I've had good luck running 2.6.0-test2 on my notebook.
I took a working .config from a 2.6.0-test2 RPM and ran it through "make
oldconfig".  This somehow caused me to loose all the CONFIG_VT* settings,
but this could have been because of my fumbling within "make menuconfig".

High memory bandwidth applications that would cause this notebook to
struggle to keep up under 2.4.20-18.9 ran as though I had more than twice
the CPU power.  For example, I usually have 15 tabs open in mozilla, but
when I run ImageMagick's animate on a series of 20+ satellite images (not
fullscreen), it usally took 10-20 seconds to start loading the images with
interactivity recovering (read as: mouse keeping up) after it finished
loading all the images.  Then, upon exiting, it would take about 10
seconds to redraw the screen without the closing window.  Flipping the
workspace to mozilla, it would take another 10-20 seconds before mozilla
was reloaded.

Now, under 2.6.0-test2, animate starts loading images immediately and runs
them fluidly.  I can even flip the workspace to mozilla, and that behaves
interactively.

Before, flipping between workspaces would cause music (under xmms) to
skip.  It no longer does that.

But all is not perfect.  I'll attach the problems I had as replies (so
each has it's own message thread).

	-Paul