dvd drive cant read knoppix cd

[powertc_g4]

my dvd drive cannot read the knoppix cd even in windows. the checksum is correct and the same cd works on my other computer with a boot floppy. i have an external firewire cd-rw drive (scsi in a firewire box), is there any way to run knoppix from that drive? thanks in advance.

[aay]

Ok there are a few different things you can try.

First, go into your bios and see if it supports booting from usb devices. I'm not sure if this will work with a usb dvd player or if it needs to be a usb hd drive, but it's worth a try.

Second, i'm not sure but I think Smart Boot Manager (http://btmgr.sourceforge.net/) allows you to boot from usb whether or not it's supported in your bios. Again I'm not totally sure about this one but it also might work.

There is a third solution that is not quite what you had in mind in terms of booting from the DVD but it will get Knoppix running on your box. I'm assuming that you have some version of windows installed on this box. What I'm about to tell you to do will let you copy the knoppix cd to your hard drive (w/o any partitioning) and boot from directly from your hd using a boot floppy. The upshot of this is that your dvd drive will then be free to be used as well.

Here's what you do.

Boot up windows.
1. Insert the Knoppix CD

2. Copy \KNOPPIX\KNOPPIX(the big file) to your CD drive. It should look something like this C:\KNOPPIX\KNOPPIX

3. Put a blank floppy in your floppy drive and then run mkfloppy.bat which is located in the KNOPPIX folder on the cd.

4. Reboot the computer with the floppy inserted and it should scan for the KNOPPIX file on your hard disk and boot from that (provided that your bios is set to boot from your floppy before you hard drive).

[powertc_g4]

i for got to mention, the dvd drive is generic and the cd-rw drive is yamaha CRW2100IX external firewire

[aay]

Crap. I was just reading your post again and I see that you say that you can't get to the contents of the cd even when you boot from windows. What program did you use to burn this cd? Can you see the contents of the CD when booted into Windows on another box? If not, I suspect that when you burned the CD you did not have Joliet support enabled. You might try reburning with Joliet support enabled. This won't help you boot from the external DVD, but hopefully it will let you see the contents of the CD and copy them to the HD once you are booted into windows.

[aay]

Ok, sounds like option number 3 (copying Knoppix to your hd) is your only option. I don't think you'll be able to boot from a external firewire device. Will either of these devices see the contents of the Knoppix CD after you are booted into Windows?

[4season]

Some DVD drives (including my older Creative) don't read CD-RWs very well, but they read CD-R without a hitch. If that's the case, just burn yourself another Knoppix CD, but on CD-R, and you should be fine.

[Loper]

my dvd drive cannot read the knoppix cd even in windows. the checksum is correct and the same cd works on my other computer with a boot floppy.
How old is your DVD drive? First-generation drives were unable to read any CD-RWs and most CD-Rs. New DVD-ROM drives are cheap, and much faster.

You might also try GAG graphical boot manager http://gag.sourceforge.net -- it's been a real problem-solver for me, as it allows me to trigger a dual-boot from a floppy -- and it may let you boot more quickly on your "other" computer.