Hi !

I'm trying to use the knoppix liveCD to familiarize myself with linux more; but can't get my mouse to work.
I have a MS Wireless (radio) optical desktop, keyboard & mouse.
After booting knoppix (vanilla 3.6) the keyboard works w/o problems but the mouse pointer stays desperately in the center of the screen
I already tried every solution I've come across, at least the feasible ones.

I can't input cheat codes because the keyboard only works after the prompt displays - you see, before it's initialized, the F-keys have an alternate set of (default) functions, normal F-keys being restored by pressing the F-Lock key (and normal alphanumeric keys don't seem to work either). What's strange is, I *can* use F8 (after F-Lock) to get to the boot options screen if I boot WinXP, I *can* use DEL to enter setup and so on - the device has always been hassle-free until now.

I tried using modprobe like suggested in the wiki and somewhere else in this forum. modprobe -r usbmouse, then modprobe hid don't return anything (even with -v ?!) and have no effect.
I tried modprobe -r usbmouse modprobe hid on one single command line (as a post on this forum "suggested" - doesn't make sense but I tried it anyway) and got stuck in a console loop.

I unplugged every device but the radio emitter - no luck, tried to edit my X config but couldn't get it to "stick" when restarting the server, and by then I was seriously getting out of my depth !

I don't really want to enable NTFS write access for now, so I'd like to find a type-in, after-boot solution (ie no changing config files and rebooting, just pure liveCD operation) - and if someone could explain to me what sequence of layers is involved to get a goddamn mouse to work ! (kernel ? X ? KDE ? I only know a few UNIX basics)

Thanks !