[gentoo-server] problems with stage 1 install: findutils won't emerge

[Kevin]

Hi All-

I'm trying to do a stage 1 installation on a Dell PowerEdge 1600SC with 
1 Xeon 2.4 GHz processor and I'm not sure how to treat the Xeon 
processor.  I've read that the Xeon is an improved version of the 
pentium4, so I've modified my /etc/make.conf accordingly.  Should I use 
CHOST=i686-pc-linux-gnu as the Handbook seems to indicate?  Any other 
flags to set for /etc/make.conf or other config files?

If there's nothing else, can someone help me figure out why I can't get 
findutils to build?  Here's my output from emerge:

===============================================
cdimage portage # emerge findutils
Calculating dependencies ...done!
>>> emerge (1 of 1) sys-apps/findutils-4.1.20-r1 to /
>>> md5 src_uri ;-) findutils-4.1.20.tar.gz
>>> Unpacking source...
>>> Unpacking findutils-4.1.20.tar.gz
to /var/tmp/portage/findutils-4.1.20-r1/work
 * Applying findutils-env-size.patch...                                                        
[ ok ]
>>> Source unpacked.
afs
configure: WARNING: If you wanted to set the --build type, don't use 
--host.
    If a cross compiler is detected then cross compile mode will be 
used.
checking build system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking host system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking for a BSD-compatible install... /bin/install -c
checking whether build environment is sane... yes
checking for gawk... gawk
checking whether make sets $(MAKE)... yes
checking for i686-pc-linux-gnu-strip... no
checking for strip... strip
checking for i686-pc-linux-gnu-gcc... gcc
checking for C compiler default output... configure: error: C compiler 
cannot create executables
See `config.log' for more details.

!!! ERROR: sys-apps/findutils-4.1.20-r1 failed.
!!! Function econf, Line 365, Exitcode 77
!!! econf failed


==================================================

The reason I'm trying to emerge findutils at this point is that emerge 
system failed when it got to this step, so I thought I'd try it 
manually.  The output looks pretty much the same when I emerge system.

My /etc/make.conf file is as follows:

===================================================
# These settings were set by the catalyst build script that 
automatically built this stage
CFLAGS="-O3 -march=pentium4 -fomit-frame-pointer -pipe -mcpu=pentium4"
CHOST="i686-pc-linux-gnu"
USE="sse krb4 kerberos samba ldap sasl doc apache2 afs acpi apm berkdb 
crypt cups emacs emacs-w3 encode ethereal evo firebird flac foomaticdb 
gpm gstreamer guile hardened imap innodb jabber jack java jikes libwww 
mad mcal mysql ncurses odbc oggvorbis pam pda ppds pdflib perl 
plotutils png prelude python readline ruby slp spell ssl svga tcltk 
tetex tiff truetype unicode usb vhosts X kde qt gnome gtk gtk2 
quicktime jpeg gif xinerama X Xaw3d xml xml2 xmms xv zeo alsa avi 
bonobo acl caps imagemagick icq ipv6"
CXXFLAGS="${CFLAGS}"
MAKEOPTS="-j2"
GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://gentoo.oregonstate.edu/"
===================================================

(I really do plan on making use of all those USE variables)

Before emerging system, I followed a recommendation from the Handbook to 
export USE="-java" to speed up compile time.  That's the only locally 
defined environment variable I've set.

I tried manually configuring the findutils tarball with:
./configure --prefix=/usr --with-afs --host=i686-pc-linux-gnu 
--build=i686-pc-linux-gnu

I also tried it without the --build option, and before that, without 
either the --build or the --host option in an attempt to determine if 
the warning I get from emerge findutils about not using --host was 
related to my problem, but all three of these manual attempts at 
configuring a findutils package unpacked from a copy of the portage 
tarball succeeded without the failure listed above (configure: error: C 
compiler cannot create executables).

Any thoughts?  It looks to me like the build process is trying to do a 
cross-compiled executable and I don't want that.  Is that what's going 
on?

Thanks in advance.

-Kevin

PS. For what it's worth:
cdimage portage # emerge -pv system

These are the packages that I would merge, in order:

Calculating system dependencies ...done!
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/findutils-4.1.20-r1  +afs -build +nls 
-(selinux)  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/slocate-2.7-r5   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/grep-2.5.1-r1  -build +nls  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] app-arch/gzip-1.3.3-r2  -build +nls -static  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/hdparm-5.4   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/less-381   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/man-pages-1.66   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/net-tools-1.60-r8  -build +nls -static  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/procps-3.1.15   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/psmisc-21.2-r4  +nls -(selinux)  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/setserial-2.17-r2   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-libs/pwdb-0.62  -(selinux)  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] app-arch/sharutils-4.2.1-r8  +nls  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] app-arch/ncompress-4.2.4   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] app-arch/tar-1.13.25-r3  -build +nls -static  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/which-2.16   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-devel/bin86-0.16.0   0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-apps/tcp-wrappers-7.6-r8  +ipv6 -static  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] app-crypt/heimdal-0.6.1  +berkdb +ipv6 +ldap +ssl  0 kB
[ebuild  N    ] net-misc/openssh-3.7.1_p2-r2  -X509 -chroot +ipv6 
+kerberos +pam -(selinux) -skey -static +tcpd  122 kB
[ebuild  N    ] sys-fs/devfsd-1.3.25-r6   0 kB

Total size of downloads: 122 kB

PPS. I started out with stage1-pentium4-pie-ssp-2004.0.tar.bz2