I have the same problem exposed by Marco: kernel 2.6.16 works fine, but 2.6.17 and 2.6.18 slow down during boot-up. My machine is a Sony VAIO FS315M laptop, and I think I've narrowed the cause to the ACPI subsystem. Appending "acpi=off" to the kernel makes it run just fine.
In 2.6.17 and 2.6.18, when running on battery works fine, but when I plug de AC adapter, the system is very slow. The message in this URL is the same problem: http://www.debianhelp.org/node/2565 Other user, same problem: http://www.debianhelp.org/node/2565 Thanks for your work.
