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Install/boot from firewire hdd, still use Knoppix for this?



Hello,

I have an old-but-not-yet dead laptop (PII 333, 128 MB of RAM, CD ROM,
2x PCMCIA slots, USB 1.1, ethernet, FireWire and Wifi PC Cards) that I'd
like to use as server.  The laptop has no internal hard drive (actually
the problem seems to be with the mobo) and so previously I installed
Knoppix 3.3 (or 3.2) on the external hard drive and booted using the
pivot_root trick described at
http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=29244#29244.  This worked
well for about 18 months.  And then my external firewire drive died.  So
six months later I've got a new external firewire hard drive and want to
repeat the trick.

- Is Knoppix still a good idea?
I've seen a fair amount of discussion about it not being a good idea to
install Knoppix as it's a mix of stable, testing and unstable and so
difficult to maintain.  This is not a desktop system, and I don't mind
spending a bit of time playing around with apt-get to fix things.

- Is a different (apt-get based) distro better (such as the Knoppix
inspired Kanotix that I've seen mentioned in some places)?

- If I use Knoppix, can I now save a lot of hassle by using the bootfrom
cheat code (Which Fabian Franz first mentioned a long time ago!), e.g.
bootfrom=/dev/sda3?

- What would I have to change to avoid typing in the bootfrom cheat
code?  I.e. I just turn on the laptop, and it automatically boots from
the firewire drive.
Is it just a case of changing a line in the minirt?

Thanks for any help/opinions :)

Chris

Christopher MC CARTHY
Integration Tester
CertEx
GL TRADE Headquarters
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