diff --git a/archiva-modules/archiva-web/archiva-webapp/src/test/java/org/apache/maven/archiva/web/action/admin/repositories/RepositoriesActionTest.java b/archiva-modules/archiva-web/archiva-webapp/src/test/java/org/apache/maven/archiva/web/action/admin/repositories/RepositoriesActionTest.java
index 40d78bc..3e8d280 100644
--- a/archiva-modules/archiva-web/archiva-webapp/src/test/java/org/apache/maven/archiva/web/action/admin/repositories/RepositoriesActionTest.java
+++ b/archiva-modules/archiva-web/archiva-webapp/src/test/java/org/apache/maven/archiva/web/action/admin/repositories/RepositoriesActionTest.java
@@ -46,9 +46,6 @@
     {
         super.setUp();
 
-        // TODO: purely to quiet logging - shouldn't be needed
-        String appserverBase = getTestFile( "target/appserver-base" ).getAbsolutePath();
-        System.setProperty( "appserver.base", appserverBase );
         action = (RepositoriesAction) lookup( Action.class.getName(), "repositoriesAction" );
     }
 
diff --git a/archiva-modules/archiva-web/archiva-webapp/src/test/resources/log4j.xml b/archiva-modules/archiva-web/archiva-webapp/src/test/resources/log4j.xml
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7780ac8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/archiva-modules/archiva-web/archiva-webapp/src/test/resources/log4j.xml
@@ -0,0 +1,36 @@
+<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
+<!--
+  ~ Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one
+  ~ or more contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file
+  ~ distributed with this work for additional information
+  ~ regarding copyright ownership.  The ASF licenses this file
+  ~ to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
+  ~ "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
+  ~ with the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
+  ~
+  ~   http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+  ~
+  ~ Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
+  ~ software distributed under the License is distributed on an
+  ~ "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
+  ~ KIND, either express or implied.  See the License for the
+  ~ specific language governing permissions and limitations
+  ~ under the License.
+  -->
+
+<!DOCTYPE log4j:configuration SYSTEM "log4j.dtd">
+
+<log4j:configuration xmlns:log4j="http://jakarta.apache.org/log4j/">
+
+  <appender name="console" class="org.apache.log4j.ConsoleAppender">
+    <layout class="org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout">
+      <param name="ConversionPattern" value="%d [%t] %-5p %c %x - %m%n"/>
+    </layout>
+  </appender>
+
+  <root>
+    <priority value ="info" />
+    <appender-ref ref="console" />
+  </root>
+
+</log4j:configuration>