Keyboard won't work, then wireless card then sound!

[Jonny_S]

Ok, the title is a little misleading. I recently got a new laptop (Dell Inspiron 550) and got out an old Knoppix CD (v3.3) I had, to test it out. With this old version my laptops keyboard and touchpad didn't work and my sound card was not detected, however I was able to connect to my wireless network. I then though i'd try out version 5.1 to see if these problems had been fixed, the mouse, keyboard and soundcard were detected and worked, however my wireless card could not be found. I then downloaded version 3.6 to see if I could find a happy medium, the soundcard wasn't but the keyboard and mouse did work however the wireless network card was still not detected! I don't mind so much about the sound card issues, but I would like to get both my mouse and keyboard and wireless card working, so can anyone point me to any helpful info? I like the look of 5.1 but I find it hard to use linux without having the net ready for reference (I'm a hobbiest coder and linux newbie).

My network card is Intel Pro wireless 2200BG.

cheers

Jon

[Harry Kuhman]

... laptop (Dell Inspiron 550) .. Knoppix CD (v3.3) .... With this old version my laptops keyboard and touchpad didn't work and my sound card was not detected, however I was able to connect to my wireless network. .

My network card is Intel Pro wireless 2200BG.
I'm not too shocked that Knoppix 5.0.1 did't work on your Intel Wireless chip. Nor am I about 3.6, as Intel has been very hard for Linux to support (no specs released, AFAIK). I'm a bit bewildered by 3.3 supporting it, since I certainly wouldn't expect support for an Intel wireless chip to be in that version. But I'm really wondering if the system booted without the keyboard working, how were you able to find out that the wireless was working?

[Jonny_S]

But I'm really wondering if the system booted without the keyboard working, how were you able to find out that the wireless was working?

Oh, well I have a usb keyboard and mouse which I plugged in and they were detected, I also found it weird that version 3.3 did support my card and future versions didn't I assumed the drivers may have been sacraficed to make room for other software.

[Harry Kuhman]

I also found it weird that version 3.3 did support my card and future versions didn't I assumed the drivers may have been sacraficed to make room for other software.
That is extremely strange, it's almost always the opposite, lots of software had been removed with every new version I've seen to allow for growth of the Kernel an more drivers, not less. This might be a good question for the Knoppix developers mailing list (http://lists.debian.org/debian-knoppix/).