In collaboration with the Department of Chemistry IT department () I run two dedicated official mirrors, one for source files and one for Gentoo Portage. Add the following to your /etc/make.conf to update your system using our (fast) servers:

GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://gentoo.chem.wisc.edu/gentoo"
SYNC="rsync://rsync21.us.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage"

Gentoo 2006.1 VMWare image: gentoo_base.tar.bz2 (569M compressed, base install, see README for details)

Gentoo 2006.0 x86 minimal LiveUSB dd image. Based on 1GB drive, but might work on smaller drives. install-x86-minimal-2006.0.USB.1G.iso.tar.bz2 (161M)

Gentoo 2008.0-r1 amd64 minimal LiveUSB dd image. Based on 256MB drive, but should work on smaller drives. gentoo.liveusb.2008.amd64.dd.tar.bz2 (73M)