Posting this from a disc-less host, using a KNOPPIX V6.0.1 LiveCD downloaded to the Vista host using BitTorrent / BitComet.
This KNOPPIX disc divined the correct network configuration from the USR5430 Ethernet / WiFi bridge, which is configured as part of an AdHoc wireless (802.11) LAN which has an Internet backhaul (configured using ICS) over a Cricket CDMA USB BroadBand modem on the Vista box.
The KNOPPIX network configuration routine psychically determined all that and configured it without having to ask me any stupid questions. That, all by itself, is freaking amazing. Contrast it, for instance, with DamnSmallLinux (DSL) [v?] which I just argued with all weekend about the identical configuration. The DSL solution required adding a eth0:1 interface as root to begin with – it got worse from there. …
So it just booted up and ran without question, so far pretty much everything working, it appears.
Notable Factoids
- no spkrs on this box, so not sure about sound
- spell checker in Iceweasel is set for German
- Iceweasel is the default browser
- Iceweasel comes with the NoScript plugin already installed (!!!)
- a /slick/ new [to me] desktop environment called ‘Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment’ (LXDE) - really nice
Oddities
Is it true that USB devices only boot if they are formated FAT/32? Some weirdness going on there. If TRUE, I could put my PortableApps and my KNOPPIX on the same 4G USB stick? Maybe?
Glitches
For some reason, the 2nd & 3rd times I tried to boot this CD on this box, it hung during the X11 initialization - I believe(d) that some BIOS changes I made may have affected this, so the current settings changed are:
- Legacy USB support: enabled
- Startup Diagnostics screen: disabled
These settings may not matter, or may be specific to this system. They are recorded here so I can refer to them later, if necessary ;)
The hanging of the X11 startup is critical, since the system will shut itself down when X11 exits, and I was unable to find a way to interrupt the shutdown from the console during the time the X server was running. This means that if X hangs on this CD, the system shuts down after a short timeout.
Out of 4 boot-up attempts, the two that have worked (first and fourth) were both simple "put the CD in and hard boot w/o going to setup or boot-device select menu" sequences.
Video Resolution Bug
The screen resolution only seems to go up to 800x600. This has to be an incorrectly selected video device driver, since this same video card will go up to 1600x1200 and has done so in the past.
