Which version of Linux would you load for your personal use?
Definitely up to your personal preference. Have a look at DistroWatch's "major distributions" page; it's got a good rundown on the pros and cons of several major distros, as well as the history behind them. Most of them come packaged as live CDs so you can try them before installing.

Lots of Linux fans run more than one distro at a time. Personally, I run 3 different Linux distros on my old workstation, but mainly use openSUSE and Parsix. I installed Ubuntu (yes, Ubuntu) on my laptop. Ubuntu draws a lot of criticism, mainly because its primary focus is on being easy to use. Ubuntu is also the most popular Linux distribution for exactly the same reason. Other than its awful artwork, silly release codenames, and over-reliance on "sudo", it's not a bad place for a newbie to start.

If Knoppix doesn't mount your ntfs partition automagically, you can pull up a terminal emulator, "su" to get root, and create a mount point if there isn't one already:

cd /media
mkdir hda1

Then mount the partition:

mount /dev/hda1 /media/hda1 -t ntfs -o ro

I prefer GUI-based partitioners like GParted over command-line ones. What you lose in granularity, you make up for with less risk of making data-destroying errors like typing in the wrong command. Check out the Parted Magic live CD. (I don't know why Klaus Knopper chose to include VirtualBox with Knoppix 6.0.1 - who's going to install a VM when running from a live CD? - instead of more useful utilities like GParted.)