Syslinux - Jun 2004 - Odd syslinux problem booting 2.6.7 kernel

I have a small embedded 486 system that is having a very strange problem 
booting the linux kernel.

The system boots fine normally, but if I don't do a proper shutdown on 
it (everything is in ramdisk anyway) then I can no longer boot the 2.6 
kernel.  It simply hangs after the "Ready.":

SYSLINUX 2.10 2004-06-18  Copyright (C) 1994-2004 H. Peter Anvin
boot:
Loading linux....................
Loading 
rootfs.gz...................................................................................................
Ready.

To resolve the issue all I need to do is start from an 2.4 kernel and do 
a proper shutdown (reboot) and all is well again.

Any idea why a kernel would refuse to start after an improper shutdown? 
   Sounds like something to do with flushing the hda device to me. The 
FAT fs that it lives on is not mounted during the power off and I can 
confirm though md5sum that the kernel image file is not changing.

Here is some information about my system:
Kernel that fails to boot after improper shutdown: 2.6.7
Kernel that will boot after improper shutdown: 2.4.25
Disk: SanDisk SDCFB-16, CFA DISK drive (16MB CF disk)
Motherboard: Whistle Interjet

Additional notes:
slow and safe (-s) doesn't resolve this

While it is possible that this isn't a syslinux problem I figured I 
would start here first since the kernel image is not changing.

Thanks,

schu

I use pxelinux.0 for x86 and x86_64 for network installs.  I use elilo for IA64
net installs.  So what should I use for PowerPC?

I know this is off topic, but I thought if any would know they will probably be
on this list.

Thanks.