> > I strip -d'd the kernel and it booted no problem at all.
...
> If this is the case, I would expect the hang not to occur until the bulky
> symbol section gets loaded though..
> 
> I'll put some code into the boot program to test for giant kernels.

Hmmm, I could be wrong here...  I just had a look at the kernel's involved:

-r--r--r--   1 root  daemon  1167631 Dec 13 12:48 netbsd
-r--r--r--   1 root  daemon  1167591 Dec 13 12:48 netbsd.GENERIC
-r--r--r--   2 root  wheel   1167631 Dec 13 16:21 netbsd.small

Looks a bit suss, also nm netbsd and nm netbsd.small produce the same
output.

But if strip -d made no difference, why did 2 different machines fail
to boot at least 8-12 times, then booted fine the first time after the
strip -d?

--sjg