Upgraded to Hoary, latest kernel won't boot

[Tommy Trussell]

I have a Gateway GP7-450 that was running OK under Warty (with some
configuration effort) but I upgraded to Hoary and discovered the
latest 2.6.10-5-386 kernel does not boot on it. It WILL still boot
using the 2.6.8-1-4-386 kernel (it issues a few complaints, but the
system seems usable).

When trying to boot the latest kernel  2.6.10-5-386 I get a couple of
messages saying

ide2: I/O resource 0x3EE-0x3EE not free
ide2: ports already in use, skipping probe

then it continues through the normal boot messages until it gets to 

Loading Modules...

and there's no additional progress. I have to hold the power button to stop it.

I tried activating bootlogd, but it gives an io error and doesn't
create a /var/log/boot file so I can't capture the exact messages on
the hang.

What is the best way to diagnose this problem? I've used Debian and
now Ubuntu for a couple of years but I'm not as savvy as some on this
list.

P.S.: When I said there was some configuration effort, I mean that in
order to get what I considered good functionality under Warty, I had
to add acpi=force to the kernel command line in order to be able to
power down, and I also had to add a line in /etc/modules to activate
the unusual digital audio card that shipped with this Gateway model.
Otherwise Warty ran very well on it.