[Nottingham] A newbie speaks... nervously

[Joe Wrigley]

> 1. Am I right in thinking Knoppix is based on Red Hat? If so, given
>    Knoppix seems to find almost all my hardware and run fine, is that
>    going to be the best distro to go for? In which case, RH9?

Knoppix is based on Debian.

> 2. Knoppix seems to have problems with my sound card. XMMS runs, but nowt
>    comes out of the speakers, and the test config only produces eerie
>    silence, claims to have installed the card fine (an AC97), but in fact
>    doesn't work. I've checked the cables, and the mixer. Any thoughts?

Not used knoppix myself, have a look at www.knoppix.net

> 3. I'm on ntl cable broadband, using an external modem (one of the silver
>    ones) through my USB port, and Knoppix is a bit iffy about it.
>    Sometimes it'll function flawlessly. Sometimes it's okay for a few
>    minutes then drops the connection. Is there a known Linux driver for
>    these things? What's the best way round it, because the absence of a
>    net connection really is the deal breaker when it comes to Linux.

I had problems with flaky cable modem/USB setup in debian. I'd suggest
getting a cheap second NIC and running it with that.

Joe