Hi,
one my work colleague has become interested in trying out Linux, and I promised him to give him a live cd.
Can you please advise me a total Linux newbie friendly live distro?

I wouldn't like him to try out Ubuntu, because I think the way Ubuntu is organized, is wrong.
And I wouldn't like him to try out Mandriva One, because, as excellent of a distro I find it to be (I run it installed on my laptop), the first startup asks very many questions concerning the make and everything else, I would like him to try something that works right out of the box without too much question answering.

Kanotix is nice, but hasn't been really been updated since 2005 or something, so what else is there?
If there is nothing else, I'll consider Ubuntu....


Thanks!

PClinuxOS, it's a fork of Mandriva and very reliable. Check it out here: http://www.pclinuxos.com/

The successor to kanotix is a distro called sidux. It's based on debian sid and has excellent hardware detection:

http://sidux.com/index.html

If you liked kanotix you will like sidux. Some of the main devs from kanotix broke away to form sidux and they put out regular updates.

There are tons live-distros of almost every major and many minor distro available. Fedora, SUSE, Mandriva, Knoppix, Sidux, Gentoo, Ubuntu, elive, ... It is almost impossible to say "this distros is the right one for you". You have to find out which distro suits your or your friends needs best.

I really just want to show off Linux to someone who hasn't experienced it before, and I want it to be a nice experience.

p.s. I just finished downloading PCLinuxOS

Meh, PCLinuxOS has the same questionare at startup as Mandriva.
Those technical questions really can scare away newbies.
Besides it painfully tries to be Windows like.

I'll download Sidux after work.

solarian, try MCNLive, it is MDV 2007.1 Spring without any questions, it will boot right to the desktop.

Download MCNLive Toronto
ftp://ftp.nluug.nl/pub/os/Linux/distr/man...cnlive/Toronto/

What is it:
http://www.mcnlive.org/index.html

And our forum is here

http://mandrivausers.org/index.php?showforum=52

I know you don't want to use Ubuntu, but I'd rethink that decision if I was you. The Ubuntu live CD is the best I've seen, especially with what you can do with it "out of the box".

For newbies I doubt you'll find anything better than Ubuntu. And because it has a seriously robust kernel I haven't seen other live CD distributions with the same level of hardware detection accuracy and support.

Humm, ok, I'll give Ubuntu live cd a try, but only to see if it would be good to a Linux newb.
Over the years I have tried Ubuntu and Kubuntu several times and it always has frustrated me even more than Slack, I like pure Debian better. The longest it has stayed installed on my box was three days.

And thanks for your suggestion on MCNLive, Chris! I hadn't heard of that distro before (happily using what works for me).

And I will also try out Sidux. I have a hunch I might like it, Kanotix was really nice.

Sidux is the best liveCD I know, currently.
But i wouldn't pass it to a noob, it's Sid/unstable, after all...
PCLinuxOS is a fine choice, and does not ask something which need knowledge of quantum mechanics at startup!

Yea, but it's daunting to answer those questions every time, even for me. I just want to start up and go.
All those questions could be answered the first time you try to access internet, etc.
Besides those questions are not something a person who just uses his computer at home and at work as a regular user would and should know, particularly the network settings.

Besides PCLinuxOS really is too Windows like (icons and sounds, and the look). I want to show Linux, not a Windows clone.
Maybe I'll really opt for Ubuntu...

I agree with you on Ubuntu - but I think it's because you're an advanced user. I can't use Ubuntu as my main distro - I prefer Gentoo. BUT - for newbs, Ubuntu is really good. They can always move onto full Debian or Gentoo or Arch or something else at a later stage.

I am deffo no fan of Winblow$ but with PClinuxOS they have gone for a nice standardized look to 'ease' the transistion from one opsys to another (which is what you want for your friend isn't it?), it is robust enough and a pleasure to use. The look and feel can be changed once the user is familiar with where to find things. The most important thing is 'can they navigate around and use the system' to get the results they want, with little or no fuss. Linux is only the kernel, what they will be looking at is GNU.

Personally I do not find it that bad a distro using a customized iconset, as log as it WORKS- and PCLOS may not be MY cap of tea, but it does work, with really few glitches.
I've even installed it on my daughter's lappy (she's twelve years old), and I can assure you she feels quite comfortable with it- although it's her first computer/OS, and her knowledge of English is not terribly good.
Setting it to use Arch Linux (as all my computers do, currently) would be a plunge in the deep- or not? She does know how to type "pacman -Sy amarok" or editing and saving in a root nano/midnight commander session, but PCLOS is really friendlier (not easier- just friendlier) to handle...

Another live distro to try is DreamLinux. Lots of eye candy on a XFCE desktop, I believe it is Debian based. www.dreamlinux.org

I second the MCNL recommendation.

I've been using it for a class i teach and its GREAT for new folks.

PLUS it has the installed ability to be run from a USB key.

That in itself got one of my students working on a project that would allow his office to use them as very inexpensive thin clients.....

j

I would recommend Ubuntu, even though you don't like it. It's quick and easy.

Elive is another recommendation. It's E17 Debian Etch build. While it may be a little difficult (way diffrent interface) it works very well. Also you can choose Nvidia driver from the live distro out of the box. But it's a bit slow on boot-up.