Can not boot Knoppix

[GTA]

Hello, newbie here. I have downloaded KNOPPIX_V5.0.1CD-2006-06-01-EN three times, and have made cd's with Isorecorder, Alcohol 120%, and Deepburner each on a seperate cd. I can not view the files on any of them. They will not boot. I also tried to mount the image with Alcohol and windows can not read disc. What am I missing? Do I need something for windows to read the iso files?

[Harry Kuhman]

Hello, newbie here. I have downloaded KNOPPIX_V5.0.1CD-2006-06-01-EN three times, and have made cd's with Isorecorder, Alcohol 120%, and Deepburner each on a seperate cd. I can not view the files on any of them. They will not boot. I also tried to mount the image with Alcohol and windows can not read disc. What am I missing? Do I need something for windows to read the iso files?

I'm amazed that anyone would say that they downloaded the iso 3 times, but not say if they had a good iso or not. It sounds like you don't even know if youir copy is good or not, and it really doesn't sound like it is.

Everything you need to know is contained in answer #1.

Although you really need to read and follow the entire faq, I'll point out a few key items: BitTorrent does it's own error checking and so gets good downloads (and can often even repair a bad download), the mirrors frequently provide corrupt downloads. While I would expect that Alcohol could burn iso files, no alcohol user has ever made the effort to update the wiki with proper burning information for that product. The faq lists several products that will work and gives the exact steps to take. No matter how you download, BT or mirrors, you should always check the md5 sum before burning the iso. If you think "I don't know what this is so I'll just ignore it" then perhaps Linux is not a good choice of an OS for you.

[GTA]

I have always been a windows user, and thought linux would be the best alternative. I am sick of trying to keep windows running. I am learning as I go. I assumed the images were corrupted, thats why I tried three times. I did not fully understand the md5 checksum, so I did ignore it. I tried with bittorrent but it was taking forever to download. I will try bittorrent again since it will do for me what I don't know how to do. Thanks for the help.

[Harry Kuhman]

Learn to use the md5 check. The faq explains it, although a quick Google search could have saved you the secod and third long downloads. If you still have those iso files you might find that you don't need to download again at all (although I expect you do, but I would styill advocate the test).

The faq also points you to the important key to getting good speed out of BitTorerent (although the BitTorrent home page also explains the importance of correctly setting up your firewall). Without this BT will crawl, with it BT will download much faaster than any mirror I've found, and will avoid the common mirror corruption problem. BT does start slow and picks up speed, so don't stop it after 30 seconds thinking "this will take all day" if you properly configured your firewalls/router.

[marhleet]

sounds like you burnt the .iso file onto the cd
as a file


instead of burning the image to disk to show the files in the .iso

the burnt cd should auto start, in windows, to show a web page of Knoppix
and the files are viewable

[GTA]

I figured out how to use the md5 ckeck and all three of the mirror downloads were incomplete or corrupt. I am downloading it again with bittorrent and can actually see the files that have downloaded so far. Before I could not see any files. I think it will work this time. It will take me awhile to get used to linux. I was going to install Debian and was told to try Knoppix cd first. Thanks for the help.

[Harry Kuhman]

Glad to hear the BT download is proceeding, although you didn't indicate how fast. It is important to properly open inbound ports for good preformance, when this is done your download speed may be close to the limit your ISP imposes on you. I have a friend with a high speed pipe at work who used BT to download the DVD ISO in about 20 minutes! With my DSL connection I can get the CD in about 2 hours or less, when the mirrors used to take 12-24 hours or more.

Trying the Knoppix CD before installing Debian is pretty good advice, unless you have a completely spare system for Debian. But when it comes time to install something to disk, do try Debian (or some other distro intended for hard disk) rather than "installing" Knoppix.

[GTA]

I configured my firewall to work with BT. It is almost done. About 2 hrs worth. Most of the cd vendors want 20 to 30 dollars for the 2 dvd Debian. I found one at http://www.discountlinuxdvd.com/ for 3.98 + .99 for S&H. Has anyone used this vendor? That really contrasts the other vendors. They said they contributed a dollar for every purchase to Debian also.

[Harry Kuhman]

I have no experience with that vendor, ....but ....

I have a real bias against buying burnt (as opposed to pressed) CDs and DVDs. Most that you get will have been burnt at high speeds and/or on questionable media and can be a problem to read. Just as important, if you have a high speed connection you don't need and don't even want a DVD set of Debian. Here's why: If you install from the DVD set and scan the DVDs in the process, Debian will ask for those DVDs again every time you want to install something. The DVD will soon become out-of-date (might be even when you get them), but you'll be asked for them whenever you install anything on them. On the other hand, with a high speed connection you can do a net-install from a minimal Debian net-install iso (about 100 megs). You install everything else from the Internet. You get the most current versions of the flavor of Debian that you pick, and you can install more applications just by doing an apt-get update and then apt-get install packagename. Since you didn't use the DVDs you are not asked to dig out the old DVDs everytime that you want to install something else.

This of course requires that you have a high speed connection that you can install from. For those without the CDs or DVDs could be handy. But since the discs are arranged so that the most popular software is on the first discs, perple seldom or ever can justify more than the first 2 CDs (usuall the first has all you want), and I really expect that just one DVD would cover more than 95% of the packages that you will install (and if you are after exotic stuff it very well may not be on the second DVD either).

So I really recommend downlloading the Etch net-install ISO (or the next "unstable" iso when Etch becomes Stable, as it is expected to do any day now), burn that to disc (I use CDRW for this), and do a net-install. Be sure to select the Desktop option if you want a GUI (it will install Gnome, but you can apt-get kde once the system is set up).

[GTA]

Well, I am veiwing this from Knoppix right now. The BT worked great. Thanks for the tip about Debian. I may try the net install. I am using a 512 sattelite connection, so that shouldn't be too bad. Now if I can just figure out where everything is Thanks for all the help.