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Trying out Linux for the desktop LiveCDs

bart on 2006-07-04T01:58:19

I've been trying out Linux distros on LiveCD, aimed for desktop use. Here are my preliminary findings.

  • Ubuntu is the current "mother of liveCD Linux". Well, apart from Knoppix, that is. It seems to work, but is sloooooowww. The PC I'm using is 1GHz/256MB, which isn't too bad, but the Ubuntu liveCD is simply unusable: a control panel that I launched still hasn't appeared after waiting for 6 minutes. And it's brown. (Gnome)
  • Knoppix works smoother on the same hardware. It is workable, and looks good. (KDE)
  • Gnoppix apparently is just an older distro of Ubuntu. It has no benefit, and I think including a banner ad for a computer fair of last year in the desktop, is a very bad idea. It's not any faster. (Gnome)
  • Xubuntu is allegedly intended for older hardware, but they should get their act together. I see no evidence that it's any faster than plain Ubuntu. Did anybody even test their claim? It definitely needs tweaking before it's really usable as liveCD "on older hardware". Lots of tweaking. (Xfce)
And the winner is... no winner. As a live CD, Knoppix seems most usable, but as I'm anxious to try out GWC, an audio editor/cleaner that only works on Gnome, it doesn't quite fit this particular purpose — as Knoppix is built on KDE. Or, can I?

Anyway, I do expect the Ubuntu family to perform a lot better when properly installed. Which I currently don't really feel like doing.

Live Linux

ajt on 2006-07-04T20:18:54

Basically in LiveCD land there is Knoppix and dozens of tweaked versions. They are all fairly full fat and slow on anything but the latest hardware. Knoppix is supposed to be the leader of the gang, but don't overlook KANOTIX, a Knoppix/Debian distro designed for notebooks. Knoppix and most things based on it are KDE based, which is very nice and pretty, but hardly fast.

If you like Gnome, then there is Gnoppix which has evolved into ubuntu live (or what ever it's called), another Debian/Knoppix distro. The Ubunutu people also make a full fat kubuntu and Xubuntu live CD, but all of them are full fat and need a lot of horse power to run from a live CD.

I like Damn Small Linux, yet another Debian/Knoppix technology distro, only this one is only 50Mb, and uses the lightest versions of everything. It's very fast and a good choice if you want to boot from a CD or USB keyring. There are a few other similar distros, Puppy is another example of an ultra minimalist, ultra fast distro.

I believe that Mandriva do a live CD distro too, and I assume that there are others based on Red Hat/Fedora, Slax and Gentoo, but I don't know them.

If you want speed then DSL or Puppy is the obvious candidate, if you want everything, then pick Knoppix - just don't expect it to be fast...

Test driving Linux live CD's

n1vux on 2006-07-05T20:35:53

I've been trying out Linux distros on LiveCD, aimed for desktop use. Here are my preliminary findings.

Are you testing the LiveCD's with a view to using the LiveCD as your desktop in CD mode regularly, or as test-drives prior to doing a real install? Those are two very different experiments.

Performance from ramdrive-and-CDrom is no prediction of performance from a real install.

Knoppix and relatives have specific optimizations (some needing bootflags) to run fast from CD only.

Knoppix and a few of the USB-flash optimized distributions have options to have partitions or files on the host system reserved for use as Swap, keeper files, profiles, etc for the LiveCD.

Ubuntu Live is more for "try before install" checking features / versions / feel than for speed. I don't know if Ubuntu "Dapper Drake" 6.06LTS Live has optimization boot options.

Xubuntu is very new. I need to try it on a couple of antiques, since I really like Ubuntu. I suspect it's speed dependson options -- and may still not be optimized for Live use the way Knoppix etc are.

Cheers,

Ubuntu Live remastered for speed

n1vux on 2006-07-05T21:00:42

c/o LiveDistro.org , here's the Ubuntu Live Speedup Remaster.

Other resources include LiveCDNews and DistroWatch.