CD based
SuSE Live Eval - as mentioned in Michael's post
DemoLinux - www.demolinux.org
Knoppix - www.knoppix.org
There are various projects around the net that are working on this sort of
thing as well. There are others that you can boot off floppies but these
tend to be fairly small systems that are designed for rescue acts.
A word of experience: I use a copy of the SuSE Eval CD when I'm fixing
other people's PC problems. I got it off the front of Linux Format, one of
the UK mags (which I read, I'm in no other way associated with them). It's
a 7.1 release and unfortunately it doesn't pick up everything on all
hardware. I've got a friend who's got a PackardBell "laptop on it's side"
model and the mouse isn't picked up. Curiously enough, the Mandrake 7
release will find it if it's installed. Sometimes it won't pick up modems
or sound cards either.
Before the SuSE people jump on me I'd like to point out:
1 - I offer this as a reminder that some kit just isn't recognised
2 - I know it's old
3 - I'm on a dialup line so I'm not about to spend 24 hours downloading
any newer version
4 - I use SuSE as my primary Linux install on 2 boxes at home (the other
boxes being iMacs which are running OS 9 and/or OS X) as it was the
only distro at the time that would correctly configure my X
installation (and a good job it did of it too)
Rod
