Just did a thorough "How To" style post at:

Knoppix: Is it possible to install that one ?

http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?pid=745128#p745128

Since there were a number of eee-specific issues being addressed, it made the most sense to post it there.

NOTE TO NON-EEE USERS WANTING TO GET KNOPPIX WORKING ON THEIR NETBOOK: Much of the advice in that post can be distilled and adapted for other netbook hardware platforms...

P.S. Sure; you can get a stock install of Debian going and do many of the desktop mods that Knoppix has done -or for those without the time to learn much of GNU Linux's internals and wanting a useful and functioning distro running on their netbook ASAP, you can just leverage off of Knoppix...