Knoppix in Windoze from Hard Drive???

[Anomaly]

Ok, so Knoppix is a version of Debian. Does Debian do all the autodetect and setup stuff that Knoppix does?

Being a complete newbie to Linux and also having ADD I need something that I can just start using and learn the details as I go along. Knoppix does a great job of this but does Debian?

Also, this may be asking too much, but it would be nice to be able to run something in a window on WinXP for a while so I can switch back and forth without a reboot like I'd have to do with a dual boot setup. That way I could play more easily until I feel ready to make the switch.

Thanks in advance.

[UnderScore]

In the furture a better subject line would encourage more people to read and respond to your questions. Also note that none of your questions are truly dumb or newibe.

>Ok, so Knoppix is a version of Debian. Does Debian do all the autodetect and setup stuff that Knoppix does?
No it does not. Debian tends to NOT be a newbie oriented distro in regards to detecting hardware. Debian has configuration utilities for the network/sound/video etc but does not have the full autodetection capabilities of Knoppix.

>I need something that I can just start using and learn the details as I go along. Knoppix does a great job of this but does Debian?
Yes it does once it is properly setup. You could run a full GUI with eyecandy or a command line with no graphics. The difficulty is in the setup and getting your hardware supported. If you want Debian but a very newbie oriented & user friendly distro then look toward Linspire, especially the recently released Linspire 5-0. If you want Debian with full autodetection and KDE look toward KANOTIX since it is based on Knoppix. If you want a less newbie orietned distro and want to run GNOME then look at Ubuntu which will have a new release in about 3 weeks.

>Also, this may be asking too much, but it would be nice to be able to run something in a window on WinXP for a while so I can switch back and forth without a reboot like I'd have to do with a dual boot setup. That way I could play more easily until I feel ready to make the switch.

See http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=0...10216&from=rss and http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtop...?p=78849#78849 for knoppix 3.8 that runs in windows. If knoppix 3.8 in windows is very slow on your system, then visit linuxtracker.org and get knoppix 3.7 for windows.

I hope this helps.
James

[Anomaly]

Thanks James, there was a lot of good info in there that I'm going to follow up on.

The original subject line was just a little self depreciating humor though, I know my questions weren't dumb. But I took your advice and renamed it.

Thanks again,
Terry

[metavoid]

Running linux inside XP

You can download a trial of virtual pc. Its perfect for learning linux as its safe to fool around with disktools.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/vir...ads/trial.mspx
A (virtual) harddisk installed knoppix runs ok but its a bit slow on heavy disk access.

I actually started having linux in a window, but current I find myself running linux all the time and using
rdesktop for having a Xp in a window.

Watch out, linux is such a nice system that XP starts to look lacking if your a power user

[Anomaly]

Thanks Metavoid, I'll check out Virtual PC.

Ultimately I do intend to move to linux as my main OS and run whatever windows apps I need in Wine or something like it.

[metavoid]

Just a quick note:

Wine is actually pretty cool. After some fiddling I was able to run office and outlook and photoshop.

You might want to check out
http://www.von-thadden.de/Joachim/WineTools/

as that help me a lot.

I only have windows program because I also do support at work so I have to have some
Windows program to look at when asked.

Gaim, Open Office, kmail and gimp-2 was all I need to never miss my win programs.

If you shop around a little, you can find native linux programs that are just as nice (or more!) than the ones
you use in XP.