404 devil if mod_rewrite is not installed

[eluser]reikje[/eluser]
I have gone live with a CI based application recently. When I checked the Apache access logs, I realised every request is a 404 but the whole site renders just fine. This was due to a .htaccess file as suggested here: http://codeigniter.com/wiki/mod_rewrite/

The snippet I question is:

Code:

<IfModule !mod_rewrite.c>
    # If we don't have mod_rewrite installed, all 404's
    # can be sent to index.php, and everything works as normal.
    # Submitted by: ElliotHaughin

    ErrorDocument 404 /index.php
</IfModule>

Since I did not have mod_rewrite installed, all the 404 errors were redirected to /index.php giving me the (false) impression that the page was working well. This might be okay for users but it will have a serious impact on how search engines see you This section should be removed. fail fast = good