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Simon Willison’s Weblog

Knoppix

So, I finally tried Knoppix today. I’d heard a lot about it and was ready to be impressed, but it still took me by surprise. If you haven’t heard of Knoppix, it’s a full Linux distribution on a CD that is designed to boot straight from the CD, without you needing to install anything and without you having to worry about it modifying the contents of your hard drive.

Getting it running was pretty simple. I had to change the boot order in my BIOS so that my PC would try booting from the CD before the hard drive (not difficult at all: hit delete as the PC is booting up and the option for changing the boot order was pretty obvious, at least on my machine), then all it took was inserting the CD and powering up the computer.

Knoppix auto-detected everything—from my graphics card and network (I guess it used DHCP) right up to the scroll wheel on my mouse. There was a moment of confusion when it came up with a ’boot?’ prompt, but it turned out I just had to hit enter for it to start auto-detection (the prompt appeared to be for advanced users to specify additional options). After that, it booted straight in to an attractively set up version of KDE 3. The ease with which it started up was the first pleasant surprise, but what really impressed me was the huge amount of software that came on that one CD. As well as KDE, Knoppix comes with the full Open Office and Mozilla application suites, all the usual Linux tools and editors, plenty of multimedia software, the GIMP (a photo editing program similar to Photoshop), even Python 2.3. Everything was available through the KDE application menus, and everything Just Worked.

The icing on the cake though was WINE. WINE is an emulation layer for Linux that allows you to run Windows applications. I had heard about it, but always been put off trying it because it sounded so complicated. Knoppix comes with WINE already installed, so I figured there was nothing to lose by trying it out.

wine notepad.exe

Windows notepad loaded up in a new, KDE style window. Wow.

Knoppix mounts your Windows hard drive (in my case as hda2) as read only, so you can play with your existing files without fear of damaging them. I browsed around my Program Files directory and tried to run WINE on various applications. Several failed, including Internet Explorer (hardly essential software, but useful for testing). I don’t know if this is because they do weird, screwed up things that WINE doesn’t yet know how to handle or if they were upset that they couldn’t read the filesystem. Whatever the reason, I was blown away by the fact that any of it worked at all. When UltraEdit loaded under Linux I positively cackled.

I’ve only made one venture in to Knoppix land so far, but it really was everything as good as people had said it was. If you have access to a CD burner and a fast internet connection you owe it to yourself to try it out.

Posted 23rd October 2003 at 2:40 am

This is Knoppix by Simon Willison, posted on 23rd October 2003.

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42 comments

  1. Knoppix absolutely rocks. I keep a copy with me everywhere I go. It serves as a rescue disk, a trouble shooting tool, a linux compatibility test, and a portable linux workstation, all on one bootable cd.

    Hand it to a friend who is still trapped in Windows Hell but considering the leap to a real operating system. Hand it to a buddy who is having trouble booting his machine. Hand it to a co-worker who can't figure out if some compontent of his hardware is fried or if it is a software problem. Give it out for free!

    Props to Knoppix!

    Dast - 23rd October 2003 02:49 - #

  2. "...right up to the scroll wheel on my mouse."

    I should give it another shot. I tried it about a year ago and it didn't pick-up my USB mouse so I moved on. Are you using a USB Optical Mouse?

    Btw: The "CD" acronym title you are using reads: "Compact Disk" when it should probably be "Compact Disc" (i think).

    MikeyC - 23rd October 2003 02:50 - #

  3. I'm using a bog standard Dell 2 button PS/2 mouse with a wheel - I have no idea what Knoppix would make of an optical mouse, but if you tried it a year ago you should definitely try it again as it's certain to have improved since then.

    Thank's the the tip on the CD thing as well ;)

    Simon Willison - 23rd October 2003 02:54 - #

  4. Thanks for posting this. Way cool. I gave up on WINE long ago, since vmware runs windows perfectly under linux.

    ratso - 23rd October 2003 03:26 - #

  5. There is a script called knx-hdinstall to install knoppix on your hard disk - It soes a very good job. Also: apt-get update; apt-get upgrade Is all you need to bring the distro up to date with debian - dead simple.

    Chris - 23rd October 2003 04:08 - #

  6. I love Knoppix. What blows me away is how it can detect the wifi card on my laptop and automatically set up the network connection via wifi.

    Rich Manalang - 23rd October 2003 04:41 - #

  7. Knoppix is awesome, but alot of people don't know that SuSe Linux has a version that boots and runs off the a cd. It's called SUSE LINUX for i386 Live-Eval. You can download it from SuSe's website: http://www.suse.com/us/private/download/suse_linux /index.html

    basstech - 23rd October 2003 05:03 - #

  8. I think your windows HD is probably NTFS? Otherwise it would have been mounted read/write by Knoppix, I think (which should be even more useful).

    Manuzhai - 23rd October 2003 09:28 - #

  9. LiveCDs are the complete bomb. I've used the Knoppix, Morphix and Slackware (the last of which fits on an 8cm CD! Perfect demo-to-friends!) and they've all been excellent - all autodetected everything in my machine, plus my network connections. The only problem I had (with all the distros) was that none of them mounted my NTFS drive correctly and I had to do it manually (it got my FAT32 drives A-OK).

    Phil Wilson - 23rd October 2003 10:17 - #

  10. Thanks for posting this; I got a copy of the Knoppix CD a year ago but I have not tried it yet! I will probably get a new upgraded version of Knoppix and give it a spin this time around. I am not sure if I am reaching, but it will probably be useful to see test web development on a Linux Browser such as Konqueror since it appears to use the same rendering engine as Safari (No, I don't have a Mac).

    Kayode Okeyode - 23rd October 2003 13:15 - #

  11. Knoppix.org is currently closed in protest of the software patents brouhaha in the EU. Blecch.

    Tk - 23rd October 2003 13:37 - #

  12. I tried it about a year ago and it didn't pick-up my USB mouse so I moved on. Are you using a USB Optical Mouse?

    I use a Logitec Optical USB mouse and it is detected without any problems whatsoever...

    It's called SUSE LINUX for i386 Live-Eval.

    I personally thought that the SuSE Live Eval CD sucked bigtime. Mostly because it failed to detect my notebook's TFT monitor correctly, I could only view everthing at 800x600 max. Boot times are longer and allowing it to create cache files on your HD doesn't help. For me it's Knoppix or nothing.

    I think your windows HD is probably NTFS? Otherwise it would have been mounted read/write by Knoppix

    Nope, my FAT32 partition is mounted read-only too... As I think it should be, rookies playing around with Linux is dangerous enough as it is...

    Bas Hamar de la Brethoniere - 23rd October 2003 13:49 - #

  13. So... is Knoppix strictly as an eval/test utility, or can you actually produce artifacts that are persisted?

    I mean, if the HD is read-only, can I use GIMP to produce (and save) anything?

    I don't mean to complain-- I'm just trying to understand the use. I have flirted with getting Linux running a few times, but each time I've had problems with the install. The answer from FAQs and newsgroups is usually "recompile the kernel", but that assumes I've already got a box running GCC (or similar), which I don't.

    I still haven't tried Debian, though.

    Jeremy Dunck - 23rd October 2003 14:41 - #

  14. Knoppix has an option in one of the menus to "create a persistent home directory", so it should be possible to use it for real work.

    Simon Willison - 23rd October 2003 15:32 - #

  15. I have a MS Optical Mouse and it detects fine on Knoppix. With Knoppix you can have it save your settings to the harddrive (ie changes to screen resolution and what not) so that next time you boot to it, it will be just as you left it. You can save files or anything else, the caveat being that NTFS support isn't the most stable for writing. If you have fat32 partitions though you shouldn't have any problem at all. I run linux as a system but use Knoppix quite a bit as a test bed on other computers, etc. I also believe it comes with memtest, which is nice on computers that don't have a floppy. And yes many distro's now have a LiveCD version of theirs so you can try it out before you install. By the way there is also Gnoppix if you want to try out Gnome in the same fashion. http://www.gnoppix.org/

    Eby - 23rd October 2003 15:46 - #

  16. I too love it. Or rather the idea of it. I've burnt CDs of 3.2 and 3.3. The first was unusable, wouldn't even boot. Release 3.3 boots but won't run KDE on my rather fully specced Dell laptop (I mean, I've got half a gig of memory, shouldn't that be enough?) I can boot and run XFCE - which is nice - but the whole thing just feels a bit too flaky to me, every time I've used it my machine has seized up sooner or later. Of course its probably just me.

    Andy Todd - 23rd October 2003 16:15 - #

  17. I tried knoppix a few months ago and it can be really useful. I keep a copy of it just in case WinXP tries to do something stupid. "It's like a friend, you can always count on it!" :)

    markku - 23rd October 2003 20:15 - #

  18. Hey Simon, writing this on Dillo on Knoppix, it's nice :) Especially as a windows user. If only I had the time to repartition and get this sorted out properly :) Cheers for making good noises about it.

    Swannie - 23rd October 2003 23:06 - #

  19. Check out my August article entitled Linux-based approach to fixing MSBlaster Worm infection and you'll see why I too have duct-taped a CD of Knoppix onto the mandatory XP machine I have at work ... BTW, I noticed a comment that someone couldn't get to the Knoppix.org ... no sweat ... here's the knoppix.net download site. Oh, and yes, my USB Optical mouse was detected.

    Mean Dean - 24th October 2003 04:33 - #

  20. Chris: in version 3.3, knx-hdinstall is not supported. Use the improved knoppix-install program instead. This is probably the least painful way of installing Linux yet.

    3.3 supports keeping your /home on a USB memory stick so you can bring it along with you in your pocket. You can also encrypt the home directory if you're the paranoid type.

    Jan Söderback - 24th October 2003 07:42 - #

  21. That's supoosed to be an ö in my last name there. No idea how it was turned into four bytes.

    Jan S. - 24th October 2003 07:49 - #

  22. The Knoppix team has made a very smart move and made all recent releases available via BitTorrent. The torrent of the English version of 3.3 moves very quickly. I downloaded my copy at well over 200KBps.

    Scott Johnson - 24th October 2003 08:19 - #

  23. can someone send me a copy of knoppix, i would like to try it

    carlo - 30th December 2003 14:51 - #

  24. I have just got done downloading Knoppix and it works really well. As far as problems with NTFS drives, if you read the docs, it recommends against trying to use them. As far as FAT32 drives, the default is read only, also in the docs. You can goto the drive properties and change to read/write. I use a Logitech wheel mouse via PS2 and had no problems with it. The wheel even works. Had absolutely NO problem configureing my HP Deskjet 5550 printer. It also recognized my ATI Radeon 7000 Video card. Haven't gotten it to work with my Creative Broadxent V92 modem yet, nor my Visioneer scanner. However, for the first day with it everything has gone REALLY well.

    Actually I came across this discussion while doing a search to see if my modem is supported. The best I've done in a few tries is to have it detected but shows up as busy on a query.

    If it helps anyone to know... I'm running a 1GHz. AMD Athalon with 256Meg RAM. ATI Radeon 7000 Video. Creative Ensoniq audio which is detected with no problem. HP Deskjet 5550 printer.

    Unfortunatly I use dial up for a connection. I use Netzero. Haven't tried to download or install yet but Netzero says it supports Linux... we'll see.

    I'm seriously taking a look at Linux since my roomies system (running windoz XP) caught a cold (read as virus) and I had to do a format and reinstall. XP will NOT reactivate as it says that it has already reached it's activation limit. Get real Microsoft!!!!

    As far as 'wine', I tried several programs and a FEW worked. The vast majority did not. Again, the fact that wine states that it is still in development and not done, who could complain? I have a feeling that it will work well when done.

    In a nutshell... considering that I can't even reinstall windoz XP on a system that is legit, and Knoppix, and Linux in general is free, do I need to say more????

    Jay Lach - 7th January 2004 03:12 - #

  25. Just trying knoppix for the first time. Does anyone know if its possible to make it run the rdesktop command on startup so I can use it as a terminal services client without any interaction from a user?

    Lee - 19th January 2004 20:49 - #

  26. I tried the Suse Live Eval version of Linux.. and it installed fine!.. absolutely no issues on my PC. (it stumbled a bit on my MS wheel mouse, but found some very good info on the variuos Linux help sites), The ONLY bugbear is not being able to make the /home persistent, as I write this I'm D/L'ing Knoppix !!.. hoping that the ability to make a persistent /home is true :) BTW, I'm VERY much a Linux newbie.. and would like to thank ALL those out there who write reams and reams of info, without which, I'd be totally lost!.

    Rick - 21st April 2004 20:53 - #

  27. Hmm, guys, I'm having problems running wine. I'll type in " wine whatever.exe" and wine says cannot find " whatever " and it's always going to the floppy looking for the file. I do believe Knoppix automatically recognizes and mounts your hd, so why won't wine go looking for " whatever.exe " in the harddrive. Wine tells me that I have to configure ( of course it always does this on bootup), and it creates the windows fake file. How do tell wine to stop looking in floppy and start looking on harddrive

    Randy - 31st May 2004 23:47 - #

  28. I tried knoppix having no knowledge of linux whatever. I thought I would use the help to see me through. Unfortunately only half the help window is showing (the other half is off screen) and I do not know how to move it over. Can someone tell me how to either mover the window to the middle of the screen or fill the screen up with the window.

    john - 23rd September 2004 17:36 - #

  29. As good as Knoppix live CD is, Kanotix (which was developed from Knoppix) is even better. The hardware detection is even better than Knoppix's great detection, and the distro is almost pure SID Debian. It's better for hard drive installing than Knoppix and it defaults to the 2.6 kernel.

    Psterrett - 24th December 2004 01:55 - #

  30. Can anyone tell me how I can install Knoppix 3.6 on the hard disk? I mean, can anyone give step by step details on how to perform a Knoppix install on a hard disk with Windows XP on it - i.e. WinXP and Knoppix existing side by side? Knoppix is one of the best Linux OSes I have ever used. It detects plug and play devices like ThumbDrives which Xandros couldn't - I tried Xandros from the cover of magazine - it's nice but not as good as Knoppix.

    kokkl - 7th January 2005 02:47 - #

  31. "Can anyone tell me how I can install Knoppix 3.6 on the hard disk?" If you have only one drive and it has but one NTFS partition, you are going to have to resize that partition. Once you do that, you just run the knoppix-install script. Although, Kanotix is much more suited to a hardware install than Knoppix. Kano, the guy who wrote all of the Knoppix post install scripts, designed Kanotix BughunterX. There is no finer Linux live CD. For those who aren't in the know, Kanotix is merely a tweaked and improved version of Knoppix. I run Kanotix BHX from an ISO image on my NTFS C: drive (on my notebook). My persistent home and configuration files are on a 1 gigabyte USB memory stick. This way I can use my CD drive and Kanotix and/or Knoppix run much faster from an ISO than from a CD. You can also run Kanotix BHX completely loaded into RAM. This is called a rich man's install. The iso option is called The poor man's install.

    Psterrett - 21st January 2005 10:35 - #

  32. How can you run Knoppix from a iso file on your hard drive? Could you give me a step by step or a tutorial for that?

    jaxx - 15th May 2005 19:36 - #

  33. Just found this website via Google, so a real help attempting to get machine up and running on the internet with Knoppix

    Eric Newell - 3rd July 2005 22:13 - #

  34. It is my first time to use knoppix but I am having difficulties with accessing the Internet when using Knoppix DERRICK KWAGALA NSUBUGA

    Derrick Kwagala - 13th September 2005 08:37 - #

  35. hey ppl.. just installed knoppix...its just great.. but please anyone can help me regarding setting up wi fi connection on my laptop it does detects the networks available but does not connect to them. Pls help me Ishmeet

    Ishmeet Singh - 17th January 2006 03:13 - #

  36. hey ppl.. just installed knoppix...its just great.. but please anyone can help me regarding setting up wi fi connection on my laptop it does detects the networks available but does not connect to them. Pls help me Ishmeet

    Ishmeet Singh - 17th January 2006 03:13 - #

  37. Running Knoppix From hard disk with out installing i have 2 hard disks on my computer hda and hdb i partitioned hdb into 2 partitions hdb1=1.2gb and hdb2 800Mbs using QTtPatred program of knoppix 4.0.2 running from live CD. logged out and restarted the computer with knoppix live cd in the cdrom drive set the boot options to boot from cd. when the cd booted entered "knoppix tohd=/dev/hdb1" and pressed enter the cd image was copied to the hard disk parttion hdb1 and then booted from there configured various devices. saved the configuration on hdb2 and also created a persisant hpme on hdb2. i have besides windows xp fedoracore4 running on dual boot basis logged out of the knoppix restarted the computer and booted the fedora core logged as root opened the boot folder and then grub folder opened the fstab.conf added following lines title KNOPPIX_V4.0.2CD-2005-09-23-EN root (hd0,5) kernel /boot/isolinux/linux ramdisk_size=100000 init=/etc/init myconfig=/dev/hdb2 home=/mnt/hdb2/knoppix.img lang=us xmodule=fbdev noprompt noeject vga=791 fb1024x768 initrd /boot/isolinux/minirt.gz nomce qui copied isolinux folder from cd rom of knoppix live CD into the boot folder of fedora core so that it becomes /boot/isilinux. restarted the computer from the gurb selected the knoppix the knoppix system booted fron the hard disk hdb1 more quickly than CD thanks i am pleased to run the system this way

    basharat - 5th March 2006 14:38 - #

  38. I got version 4.0.2 of Knoppix this year for a laptop. Just getting to know it. My internal wireless card doesn't work when i run it. I don't know anything about using the Linux kernel, still learning everything. Is there anything in particular i can do at the boot prompt to get knoppix to recognize (and use) my wireless card? Another thing is, i can't make my usb drive writable. anything i can do?

    Mike Pettitt - 18th March 2006 20:31 - #

  39. When I boot up with the command at the isolinux boot up â??knoppix home=/mnt/sda1/knoppix.imgâ?? knoppix always comes up with a window saying it found an image file ( /mnt/sda1/knoppix.img) click ok to activate in 20 seconds. If I donâ??t click anything it will not mount my persistent drive. How do I have it mount the persistent drive without asking me again even though I tell it to at the isolinux bootup prompt?

    Mark - 28th March 2006 19:06 - #

  40. I love running my Knoppix 4.0.2 CD online (broadband), but my HP laptop WiFi Mini-PCI wlan card (Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG)is not compatable. I have a Pentium M Centrino 1.6GH. Is there a CD compatable Mini-PCI card?

    Edge - 6th April 2006 16:22 - #

  41. I have an HP dv1000 and the Intel Pro/Wireless 2200BG works fine for me using the Knoppix CD and the 4.0.2 DVD

    Matt - 24th April 2006 01:05 - #

  42. I recently just ordered a new laptop for university and it will come pre-installed with windows xp home. I will be using linux at university and thought it would be a good idea to dual boot my laptop with xp and a distribution of linux (maybe fedora as thats what the university has)and looking on the net it says to partition the hardrive using knoppix. If I do partition the hard drive (keeping xp) and install fedora, when i next boot xp will i be asked to activate again, as there has been a hardware change. Any help please. Dom

    Dominic - 4th October 2006 17:08 - #

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