i am also a learner... both in driving and linux... but i know just enough to answer your first problem...

The problem:
My Knoppix v3.4 does not see internal hard drives and network card on my brand new computer. The first thought was that the system is too old for my new Dell box w/o OS. So I downloaded the latest v3.7 on external (formatted as FAT32) USB drive using Widndows computer.
"card on my brand new computer. " ok, you know as much as i, that when new stuff comes out, any OS wont have the compleate details on it... so, it wont reconize it...

just wait... i am not finished...