Knoppix is such a useful disc in and of itself; backup/restore tool (for Linux and Windows), Linux introduction and learning tool, Debian installer, and more--and free. It's the installer aspect that I'm so pleased with right now.

I recently reinstalled Linux to my system using the latest version, using the latest version of the install script. From start to finish, it took less than 30 minutes. After I answered a few questions, the rest continued unattended; the resulting install needed very little fine-tuning.

This was much better than my previous Knoppix install, from a June version. Though I was pleased with the eventual outcome, it took a lot more tweaking to get it to a useable state. Admittedly, I know a lot more about Linux now than I did then--and I hardly use Windows anymore--but the new installer script works great. I would dump Windows completely, if I didn't have to help the oldsters with it (I teach computers to senior citizens for a nearby city's recreation center) and answer questions for others (not that I mind--I'm here, ain't I?).

As much as anything, I did a scratch reinstall as a learning tool. I'm glad I did. Another good thing: using Knoppix, I was able to back up my old version in less than 15 minutes--I can always fall back if I have to.

In my opinion, with hard drives being so cheap these days, there's no reason for a serious/power user to not have a dual-boot (or even triple-boot) machine.

Knoppix is good. Another alternative is Mepis linux. I started using it a couple of weeks ago, installed the newest beta a day ago (the last full release was in August). The beta will be released next week or you can send an email and join the beta team. A live cd install with one click, has gnuparted to resize winxp partitions. But Knoppix is the one that led the way.

I have a knoppix disk that I boot to and run from the CD ,I haven't played with it that much ,no time ,was wondering can this same cd install on hard drive .

Knoppix can be used as an installer, though I would make sure to use the latest version (currently V3.3-2003-11-19). There's a script called knoppix-installer which automates most of the process; it takes roughly 30 minutes, including initial setup.

How complex the process is depends on what other OSs you have installed. If you are running Windows 2000 or XP, you may be running the NTFS file system, which Linux can read but can't write to directly (though there is now a "wrapper" so that Windows' own NTFS driver can be used indirectly).

In my case I have a separate hard drive with Linux installed (they are pretty cheap these days). All my partitions except Linux are vFAT, so I can read them from Windows or Linux. A utility on the Knoppix disc can also be used to re-size non-NTFS partitions without loss of data.

thanks

once you have it running just bring up the console and type " sudo knoppix-installer" and the auto installer will do the walk thru. once installed you can go to system then KPackage and download a wide veriety of debian programs . you will need 1 floppy disk for the installation process for a lilo boot loader should the computer lose it or it becomes corrupted. also when the installer asks where to place the lilo file check the mbr file.