Any Knoppix users out there?

[mrsinbad]

My brother in law showed me this new operating system. He was telling me about its stability, security features, and applications that come along with it. I'm a long time Windows user and it seemed to have a high learning curve. What do you guys think of it and is the transition painful?

Also, I did a Google search for the download site and I keep getting bounced all over the place. Anyone got a link to post here PM me with? Any reference materials out there too?

Thank very much.

 

[kingoftf]

I ´ve often tested the SUSE Linux.
Linux as it is not very complicated, just install it and it runs very smooth and "windows-like"
The problem is if you want to install third party software you have to handle and solve a huge amount of conflicts and dependences.
Another quite big problem is the hardware of your computer, e.g. scanners and printers, sorry, no driver availabe for this stuff.....
F.e my brand new Scanner from Canon is not supported by Linux.........

That´s the reason that I always switched back to XP after installed almost every Linux Distribution like SUSE, MANDRAKE aka MANDRIVA, FEDORA ......

Till 2005 when I switched finally to a Mac......

Trial and error.....

 

[kingoftf]

http://www.knoppix.org/

Klick on the flag to chance language to english

DVD English

ftp://ftp.ux0.de/pub/linux/knoppix/DVD/KNOPPIX_V5.1.1DVD-2007-01-04-EN.iso

CD English

ftp://ftp.ux0.de/pub/linux/knoppix/CD/KNOPPIX_V5.1.1CD-2007-01-04-EN.iso


Or, sometime a bit faster to download via torrent or Emule:

http://torrent.unix-ag.uni-kl.de/torrents/KNOPPIX_V5.1.1DVD-2007-01-04-EN.torrent

http://[url="ed2k://|file|KNOPPIX_V...ed2k://|file|KNOPPIX_V5.1.0DVD-2006-12-30-EN.ed2k://|file|KNOPPIX_V5.1.0DVD-2006-12-30-EN.[content.emule-project.net].iso|4313311232|09A7D60D465C7E8BE3D937FB72A8F8C5|s=http://ftp.freenet.de/pub/ftp.uni-kl.de/pub/linux/knoppix/DVD/KNOPPIX_V5.1.0DVD-2006-12-30-EN.iso|s=http://www.kernel.org/pub/dist/knoppix/knoppix-dvd/KNOPPIX_V5.1.0DVD-2006-12-30-EN.iso|s=http://ftp.chg.ru/pub/Linux/knoppix/DVD/KNOPPIX_V5.1.0DVD-2006-12-30-EN.iso|/

http://[url="ed2k://|file|KNOPPIX_V...]ed2k://|file|KNOPPIX_V5.1.1CD-2007-01-04-EN.ed2k://|file|KNOPPIX_V5.1.1CD-2007-01-04-EN.[content.emule-project.net].iso|730177536|0A042860163E6F797787A41564AADB38|/|sources,michaelbrunner.de:4646|/

Have to copy the whole ed2k links to your Emule client.

 

[ACMarina]

Knoppix is good for a CD distro, but there are other options out there depending on what you want to do. Fedora's not bad, SuSE is pretty good too. I'm personally a Debian fan, which is the core of Knoppix, and for some installable alternatives you could look at Mepis, Xandros or the ever-popular Ubuntu..

 

[bobisculous]

I have tried Linux in general multiple times, just never could get the hang of it. I really wish I could, because I can definately see the good that comes with it. Arch is the main one I used. It was neat knowing what it could do, but I never could get it to do stuff. I unfortunately did not have the Patience to learn it, so now I am back, and stuck with Windows.

-C

 

[Illum]

Knoppix is more of a CD based software instead of the traditional hard drive booted windows your used to...so that saves alot of time trying to uninstall windows and shift....plus its reversable when you want to return to windows, just pop out the CD

it acts like a preview for Linux..you'll enjoy it

 

[SKYWLKR]

Ubuntu is by far the best for transitioning a windows user to linux...

 

[bitslammer]

Ubuntu is by far the best for transitioning a windows user to linux...

Unless it won't recognize your WLAN card as is my case. Since I wanted to try it from a bootbable CD I'm unable to get it working. Oh well... another addition to my Linux drink coaster collection.

 

[jrmcferren]

Unless it won't recognize your WLAN card as is my case. Since I wanted to try it from a bootbable CD I'm unable to get it working. Oh well... another addition to my Linux drink coaster collection.

WLAN cards are a big pain with Linux in general.

 

[PhotonWrangler]

I've used bootable Knoppix-style distros for various troubleshooting tasks including rescuing NTFS-formatted data from crashed hard drives. Very handy in circumstances like that!

 

[ACMarina]

K/x/ubuntu both found my wifi card right off the bat with no trouble..

 

[Pellidon]

I use Ubuntu at home now. All my stuff is either ols enough or tame enough for it to be detected. My notebook runs Fedora Core and almost works on wiireless. It does work with puppy Linux. The Samsung Q1 tablet PC I use on the road almost works and probably will with some work.

Windows has almost lost me as a customer due to there constant updates they ship to my industrial PC vendor. Each breaks ths API and I spend a week hacking my code that worked without change on 20 W98 and 3 W95 systems. 4 Xp boxes to date, 4 weeks wasted tweaking and hacking to overcome their lazy sloppy programming.

But that's my rant.

 

[Dawg]

I had a couple of copies and never was able to figure it out. The whole operating system on a bootable CD thing was appealing to me. I am just a dunce when it comes to computers.

 

[kingoftf]

just typed in this text 3 times and every time the IE 7 kicks me off.....


Ok, one more time:

@Dwag:

If you want to boot from the CD, you have to change the boot sequence in the BIOS to "First boot device CD"
Then drop in the CD and your PC will start from this CD with Linux.


My first steps with Linux have been in 2001 with SUSE 7.3, a real challenge, very poor hardware recognition, I spended a lot of nights in front of the monitor to compile the kernel and installing drivers for my printer without GUI, just the console......:hairpull:

Nowadays Linux is almost as easy as Windows, just put in the CD, lay back and its done, no need to type in a key, no registration, no Virus-Trojan-Phishing-HELL, a very good GUI (KDE and GNOME
And automatic Updates windows-like.

If you own a stock PC it should work hassle-free and very smooth.
The Software installation with the .rpm-Files (SUSE) is as easy as the .exe on WIN

Only sometimes the still challenging with third party sorftware and still there is a huge Scanner-black hole (very poor support)

Therefore, in my opinion the perfect OS is OS X, perfect 100% Hardware-Software recognition and support.
My iMac is like a VW Beatle, it runs and runs and runs....
Since 2005 24/7 365 days a year, no shutdown, no bluescreen, just use it.....

 

[Gimpy00Wang]

As some have started to get into, there are LOTS of things to consider and deal with when transitioning from Windows to GNU/Linux (recent Stallman speech... ). Anywho...the recommendation I give to people is to first check your core hardware (CPU, RAM, motherboard, etc...) and peripherals (scanner, printer, card reader, etc...) to see if they will work. There are plenty of online resources where you can search to see if others have had success in getting a particular component to work. In the case of ubuntu a quick search on ubuntuforums.org should reveal useful clues. Now that you know what you're getting into in terms of hardware, you can better guage if you want to make the leap. If you just happened to buy a super awesome $500 scanner/printer/fax that you CANNOT live without, cannot return, and cannot get to work, going to GNU/Linux might not be reasonable -- at least for whatever machine you want to use that MFP on.

I would suggest checking out ubuntu first. It has a HUGE community of users to help you if/when needed. You can run it off the CD to test it out. And most importantly, it offers a pleasant desktop experience for even the novice Windows user.

- Chris

 

[eluminator]

You can install Linux and XP on the same machine. I mainly use XP but I have Fedora installed also.

I wish the Linux installers would make it easy to use Microsoft's boot loader (ntldr) but they don't. If you install Linux and don't jump through some hoops, you will end up using Linux's loader for everything. That may be good, but I've never done it that way. I don't know what happens if you do it that way and then decide to remove Linux.

I like to have a live Linux around for troubleshooting. The one I have now is Beatrix. I had Slax in the past but it wouldn't boot up on one of my machines.

 

[gadget_lover]

On the hardware support issue...

My wife's PC running windows cannot sync to the MP3 players in her cell phone and stand alone MP3 due to a driver conflict. It happens to everyone....


I'm a hardcore linux user, probably because I'm also an old school Unix guy too. I'm very comfortable with it. It fulfills my daily needs quite well.

I buy hardware that is compatible with my OS. If you think about it, you'd not buy a program written for XP and expect it to run on WIN95, right? You would not buy a Mac peripheral without checking that there are XP drivers, would you?

In many cases, the scanners and printers are part of a family of devices that share a protocol. My printer speaks Postscript and can do 30 pages per minute. My scanner is a Cannon, and it scans just fine. My modem? Who cares anymore?




Daniel

 

[h_nu]

There are lots of good Live CD's to try. I am using Slax right now. I loaded it into RAM and I'm using my Netgear PCMCIA card with WPA wireless. It's amazing how much you can do with the right CD.

 

[wquiles]

Interesting thread!

I have tried various Linux "flavors" on and off since 2000 or so, but so far I always come back to Windoze due to some applications that I "need" don't run/exist in Linux.

I now have a very powerful Workstation (Tyan K8WE, dual Opteron 2.6GHz, 2GByte Ram, over 1 Terrabyte of HD's, dual monitors, etc. - moving to Opteron 285 dual-cores in about 4-6 months!!!) and now that I am very experienced with VMware, I am about to run Linux natively and then run a VMware session of Windoze XP Pro SP2 for those utils I can't be without

So far, I have decided to try the "you-compile-it-yourself-from-source-and-optimize-to-your-hardware" distribution called Gentoo, and I will do the AMD64 bit option with the 32bit alternate libraries to run both sets of apps

Will

 

[Fallingwater]

I'd just like to point out that there are applications that can synchronize dependencies and the like. They automatically download and install whatever's necessary.
Or at least, I've been told so. I can't use Linux on my notebook because it hangs every time, and on my old computer I still have an old version of Mandrake... can't be bothered to upgrade.
I'll try Ubuntu when I get a new computer (or when I figure out why the notebook crashes).