handy hint for rebooting stubbborn/failing computers

[daveca]

Im wrangling with a Laptop trying to get Knoppix 5.x to load, which loads on someone elses computer fine, but not mine. Its freezing so bad I have to kill the power. Removing the laptop battery and running on AC power does the trick, yank the power cable = instant reset.

Now to go find my Knoppix hammer...

[krishna.murphy]

Im wrangling with a Laptop trying to get Knoppix 5.x to load, which loads on someone elses computer fine, but not mine. Its freezing so bad I have to kill the power. Removing the laptop battery and running on AC power does the trick, yank the power cable = instant reset.

Now to go find my Knoppix hammer...

I understand your feeling. Grr! Bad news - I think you have a marginal disk. Good news - it's not so hard to fix. Try the media self-test, i.e.

knoppix testcd

at the boot prompt (use F2/F3 to get help specific to v.5) to check whether you have a good burn on the disk. There are a LARGE number of bad/marginal burns and/or downloads. If it isn't okay, check the md5-sum of your ISO file to make sure it's right, then re-burn at a slower speed, or use another media type if you have one, i.e. CDRW. If you can't use the much more modern v.6.2, that's fine, but it has a LOT of advantages.

Cheers!
Krishna