| CD-based Linux Distributions (Live CDs) |
| A d v e r t i s e m e n t |
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ADIOS |
| ADIOS is a Red Hat based live CD with excellent hardware auto-detection, option to install the system on hard disk and option to save configuration files to floppy or USB storage devices. Created by the Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia, ADIOS comes with a choice of KDE, GNOME or IceWM desktop environments and support for LIDS (Linux Intrusion Detection System), squashfs, IPsec and User Mode Linux.
The ADIOS page...
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Arabbix |
| Arabbix is the world's first Arabic Live-CD (run-from-CD) distribution that showcases Arabeyes' and others' accomplishments and results - it includes most of the applications an Arab user might require or need. Arabbix is not only intended to attract new users and to cement the virtues of Open Source and Linux as a fully functional Arabic desktop medium, but is also hoped that it will engrave into people's hearts and minds Arabeyes' "can be done" and "results oriented" attitude and goals.
The Arabbix page...
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Augustux |
| Augustux is a live CD GNU/Linux distribution based on Debian and Knoppix, created by the Linux user community at Zaralinux in Zaragoza, Spain. It has full support for the Aragonese language.
The Augustux page...
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Blin Linux |
| Blin Linux, created by the Zaporozhec Linux User Group (ZLUG) in the Ukraine, is a free Linux operating system for x86 processors. It doesn't need to be installed on a hard disk as it is run directly from the bootable CD. The comfortable graphical user interface, based on Ximian GNOME, and excellent support for cyrillic alphabet (Russian, Ukrainian...) makes Blin Linux a useful alternative to similar existing products. It is designed for novice users who have just started using Linux as well as for experienced system integrators. The distribution's web site is in Russian.
The Blin Linux page...
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ByzantineOS |
| ByzantineOS is an interesting CD-based distribution created by Georgios Georgopoulos from Greece. The ISO image only occupies 48MB of space, yet it provides a full graphical environment via VESA or one of the supported graphics cards (NVidia RIVA/GeForce, ATI Rage128/PRO). The desktop manager is based around the Mozilla browser, or more precisely on the OEone's Penzilla project. It boots straight into the Mozilla desktop. At that stage, it is safe to remove the boot CD as all the available programs have been loaded into memory. As you can imagine, the 48MB ISO image does not provide a plethora of applications, but it offers Internet browsing, email, a Nintendo games console emulator and a few other simple applications. The included media player (based on MPlayer) is capable of playing DVDs, even encrypted ones.
The ByzantineOS page...
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CDlinux |
| CDlinux is a CD based mini Linux distribution, which runs from a CD-ROM. It aims to be an administration/rescue tool for East Asian (CJK) users. CDlinux is also highly user configurable, and supports a wide range of hardware (PCMCIA, SCSI, USB, etc). At present time, only simplified Chinese is fully supported.
The CDlinux page...
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ClusterKnoppix |
| ClusterKnoppix is a modified Knoppix distro using the OpenMosix kernel. Features:
- OpenMosix terminal server - uses PXE, DHCP and tftp to boot linux clients via the network
- No cdrom drive/harddisk/floppy needed for the clients openMosix autodiscovery - new nodes automatically join the cluster (no configuration needed)
- Cluster Management tools - openMosix userland/openMosixview Every node has root access to every other node via ssh/RSAkeys MFS/dfsa support
- Every node can run full blown X (PC-room/demo setup) or console only (more memory available)
The ClusterKnoppix page...
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Cool Linux |
| Cool Linux is a product of Andrei Velikoredchanin, also known as "Uncle Andy" from Russia. The bootable CD is based on Red Hat Linux with full graphical environment and IceWM as the only desktop. Several nice touches distinguish this product form other CD-based distributions - the CD includes NVidia drivers, the Blender 3D modeling application and a functional trial edition of VMware. On the negative side, the hardware configuration is done with Red Hat's Kudzu and Xconfigurator which requires user interaction during boot. Most of the selected applications are on the light side of system resource requirements (e.g. Opera, Sylpheed) with one notable exception - OpenOffice 1.0 as the only office suite.
Another project from the same author is called Emergency Linux CD, which is a bootable rescue CD that includes troubleshooting and diagnostic tools for Linux servers.
The Cool Linux page...
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Damn Small Linux |
| Damn Small Linux is created by John Andrews in California. It is a live CD distribution based on Knoppix, but its size has been reduced drastically to fit on a 50MB business-card shape CD. This is only the second "business-card size" distribution in our database, the first one being the better-known LNX-BBC. The main difference between the two is the fact that LNX-BBC is more of an expert rescue tool with a collection of utilities to repair damaged installations or recover data, while Damn Small Linux is a general purpose distribution to carry around in your wallet. It comes with XFree86 and Blackbox as the only available window manager, while other light-weight applications for email, word processing, instant messaging and playing music are also included.
The Damn Small Linux page...
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DemoLinux |
| DemoLinux is one of the oldest and best-known CD-based distribution. Created by a 3-man team of Vincent Balat, Roberto Di Cosmo and Jean-Vincent Loddo at the Paris VII University in France, DemoLinux is a general purpose distribution based on Debian with automatic hardware detection, multi-lingual features, KDE and GNOME desktops and a whole range of applications. If you are interested to learn more, NewsForge has a full review of its latest release.
Useful as DemoLinux may be, it shows its age with old versions of most of its software and little signs of active development. If you are looking for a general purpose CD-based distribution, you might be better off with Knoppix.
The DemoLinux page...
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Devil-Linux |
| Devil-Linux was created by Heiko Zuerker, a US-based German IT manager (see this interview published by Portazero). It is a specialist Linux distribution designed primarily to be used as a CD-based firewall or router. The goal of Devil-Linux is to have a small, customizable and secure Linux installation. Of course, the main advantage of a CD-based firewall is that the files on the CD cannot be modified by an intruder - if you think somebody managed to break into your system, just reboot and the data in the RAM-disk are clean again. The other advantage is that it only takes 15 - 30 minutes to have your firewall up and running.
The Devil-Linux page...
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Dynebolic GNU/Linux |
| The Dynebolic project is being developed by a small group of European developers led by "jaromil" at PublicVoice.fm streaming network in Vienna, Austria. The main feature of the 300MB Dynebolic CD is its full preconfiguration for live-streaming over the internet. With the MuSE software, it gives everybody not only a fancy audio player, but also a live-recording studio, which can mix and stream out to the Internet. Besides multimedia applications, the CD offers all the usual software for web browsing and email (Mozilla) as well as graphics (Gimp) -- all running on top of the Blackbox window manager. The system boots straight into a graphical environment, courtesy of the VESA framebuffer driver, no questions asked.
The Dynebolic GNU/Linux page...
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Eagle Linux |
| Eagle Linux is a project by Mike Angelo in the USA. The project differs from the rest of the distributions listed on this page in that Eagle Linux is not a complete, ready-to-use Linux CD, but rather a document describing how to create one. As such, it is a great learning tool, suitable for educational establishments. Two versions of the document have been released - version 1.0 builds a bootable CD from of an existing Red Hat installation, while version 2.0 does the same for Debian users. Besides building a CD, the documents can also be adapted to building embedded Linux systems running on various platforms and processors.
The Eagle Linux page...
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eLearnix |
| eLearnix (formerly FreeLoader Linux) is a product of Canada-based Softkits and based on Slackware Linux. It is a 320MB bootable CD with the idea of introducing new users to Linux without having to install it on their hard disks. The distribution's web site offers very little information so the only way to learn about its features is to try it out. Be sure to download the FREE2.iso file, which is a more complete product with KDE 3.0.1 as its desktop environment. Booting from the CD will first take you to a console where you can do some basic configuration (help and tools are provided) before starting KDM. This will give you a choice of three accounts to select from - depending on your needs and eye candy mood - "root", a MacOS-like "max" and WindowsXP-like "xpress". Once logged in, the usual array of useful software breathlessly awaits your mouse clicks.
The eLearnix page...
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FIRE |
| FIRE is a portable bootable CD-based distribution with the goal of providing an immediate environment to perform forensic analysis, incident response, data recovery, virus scanning and vulnerability assessment. It also provides necessary tools for live forensics/analysis on win32, SPARC, Solaris and x86 Linux hosts just by mounting the CDROM and using trusted static binaries available in /statbins. In other words, FIRE is a Linux distribution with lots of useful security tools and a fine menu system which makes it very easy to use. Nothing on your computer is modified, so you can try it out safely.
The FIRE page...
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Flonix |
| Flonix is a light-weight GNU/Linux Operating System for personal computers. It is based on Damn Small Linux. There are two editions: Flonix USB Edition can be installed on an USB flash drive or compact flash card (64MB and more) and Flonix CD Edition, which is a live CD.
The Flonix page...
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The Freeduc CD |
| The Freeduc CD is a live Linux CD built by the Organization for Free Software in Education and Teaching (Ofset). Ofset is a legal organisation based in France with the goal to promote the development of free software for the educational system. Freeduc is a modified Knoppix, excluding some of the memory intensive applications and including useful educational software. The removed applications were replaced by less resources-hungry alternatives as the CD is designed to be used to power low-end computers, often found in schools. The CD boots straight into a graphical environment, which is managed by intuitive and light-weight XFce windowing system. Besides French and English, Freeduc also supports a number of European languages.
The Freeduc CD page...
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GeeXboX |
| GeeXboX is a full operating system, running under Linux and based on the excellent MPlayer. No need for a hard drive, you just have to put the GeeXboX bootable CD into the CD-Drive of any pentium-class computer to boot it. Moreover, GeeXboX is a free software, created thanks to many open-source software. This means that everyone can modify it and build his own release of the GeeXboX. At the time of the first developpement releases (Dec. 2002), it was only able to play DivX movies, but for now, nearly every kind of media files can be played from GeeXboX, our OS supporting for example: MPEG 1/2 movies (MPG files, VCDs, DVDs ...), MPEG 4 movies (DivX, XviD ...), RealMedia and Windows Media movies, OggMedia streams, audio streams like MP3, Ogg/Vorbis, WAV (AudioCD), AC3...
GeeXboX.
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Gentoo LiveCD |
| gentoo Linux has put together two types of self-booting live CDs - game CDs and live CDs for PPC. The game CDs include either a playable demo version of Unreal Tournament 2003 or a full version of America's Army. The games can be played on any modern PC with nVidia GeForce 2 (or greater) graphics card and a CD-ROM drive. Full networking, OSS sound, Creative Soundblaster Live! and Audigy support included, allowing for the full gaming experience including LAN/Internet play, EAX environmental audio and of course 3D accelerated OpenGL graphics. The bootable live LinuxCD for the PPC platform (first such product ever created for PPC users) comes with a choice of either GNOME or KDE as the desktop environment. You can download both from one of the Gentoo mirrors.
The gentoo page...
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GNOPPIX |
| GNOPPIX is a Linux live CD based upon Debian GNU/Linux. It can be compared to Knoppix, but GNOPPIX uses GNOME as the desktop environment.
The GNOPPIX page...
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Hakin9 LIve |
| Hakin9 is a magazine about security. It is read by people responsible for computer systems security, programmers, security specialists, professional administrators, as well as people taking up security issues in their free time. Hakin9 Live is bootable distribution, based on Aurox Live, containing all the tools and material needed to practice methods and techniques described in articles.
The Hakin9 Live page...
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Knoppix |
| Developed by Klaus Knopper in Germany, it is safe to say that Debian-based Knoppix has raised the bar of standards to a new level, especially with its automatic hardware detection that puts many well established commercial Linux distributions to shame. Its hands-free booting, enormous selection of software, its on-the-fly decompression technique and the ability to install it on a hard disk have turned Knoppix into an indispensable tool. It can be used as a rescue disk, a tool to demonstrate Linux to those who haven't seen it or a tool to test a new computer before purchase. It can even be used as a full-blown Linux distribution for every-day tasks.
Knoppix has been covered extensively in Linux media: Project of the week: Knoppix 3.1, distro run from CD (Linux and Main), Knoppix Linux - Filesystem runs "Live" from CD (PC Buyers Guide), Knoppix a tasty open source try-out (ComputerWorld), A Linux you can try before you even install it (LinuxWorld), Bootable Linux Demo Distro - Knoppix (Slashdot), Interview with Klaus Knopper (DistroWatch), Interview with Klaus Knopper of Knoppix (OSNews).
The Knoppix page...
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Kurumin Linux |
| Kurumin Linux is a new Brazilian project based on Knoppix. Developed by Carlos E. Morimoto, Kurumin Linux seems to have gained many followers in a very short time. The CD boots into a graphical environment with Brazilian Portuguese as the default language and KDE as the default desktop. It differs from Knoppix in that many packages have been removed, so the size of the full ISO image is less than 200MB. The Kurumin Linux web site is very active, with plenty of good documentation, active user forums and download mirrors.
The Kurumin Linux page...
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LindowsCD |
| LindowsCD allows anyone to run LindowsOS Operating System from any computer without installing anything. Simply pop the CD in any computer's CD tray and turn on the computer. LindowsOS will then load and run, right from the CD! LindowsCD does almost everything LindowsOS does, such as surfing the Internet, sending and receiving email, and instant messaging with friends. LindowsCD even includes a complete, Microsoft-compatible Office Suite for word processing, spreadsheets, and presentations! If you're already a Linux convert, use LindowsCD to show your friends, right on their own computers, what all the excitement with Linux is about. LindowsCD is also the safe and easy way to test the compatibility of any computer before installing Linux or LindowsOS. LindowsCD retails for US29.99.
The LindowsOS page...
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LinuxConsole |
| LinuxConsole is a GNU/linux operating system that works with minimum configuration from user. Start the computer, put the CD in and play ... like a game console. Based on Debian GNU/Linux. Currently, only a French edition is available.
The LinuxConsole page...
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LNX-BBC |
| The Linux Bootable Business Card (LNX-BBC) project is a creation of Duncan MacKinnon, Tom Crimi, and Seth David Schoen - originally from San Francisco-based Linuxcare who forked the project in May 2001 under the present name. The idea was to produce an emergency rescue disk which would fit on a small, business card-type CD, which you could carry in your wallet, always ready to tackle any hardware or software emergency. The CD includes many troubleshooting and diagnostic utilities, configuration tools and even X-window with the Blackbox window manager and a browser. It's quite amazing how much one can fit on a 40MB CD!
Unlike most other projects in this category, LNX-BBC has an excellent web site with plenty of documentation, resources and active development. Well worth checking out!
The LNX-BBC page...
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Morphix |
| Morphix is a run-from-CD Linux distribution based on Knoppix, but with a number of differences: it has modular design, it can be easily installed on a hard disk and the developers provide a number of pre-made CD images with a different target audience - namely Morphix Game, Morphix HeavyGUI (based around GNOME), Morphix KDE and Morphix LightGUI (based around IceWM). It is currently under heavy development with some interesting new features, such as a graphical partition manager.
The Morphix page...
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MoviX |
| MoviX is one of those fantastic projects which shows that the right combination of a bright idea, free software and available source code can produce amazing results. MoviX was created by Roberto De Leo in Italy when he wanted to watch a DVD on a computer where installing Linux on the hard disk wasn't an option. So he created a bootable Linux CD, which booted into a graphical desktop and automatically started MPlayer. When MPlayer was loaded, he removed the boot CD, inserted his DVD and pressed the play button to start the show!
That was in the beginning and the project has now evolved into several different branches each with its own focus. Provided that your graphics card is supported, MoviX can help you to play encrypted DVDs (note: this is no longer true as of April 2003 - the author has removed the libdvdcss library due to potential legal problems), VCDs and other multimedia file formats (VCD, DivX, avi, mpg, mp3, ogg...) on your computer, even if its hard disk contains a wrong or no operating system! It can always come handy so download it now - the size of the compressed ISO image is only 22MB.
The MoviX page...
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Oralux |
| Oralux is a Knoppix-based GNU/Linux distribution for blind or visually impaired people. Its user interface is based on Emacspeak, an audio desktop created by T. V. Raman. Emacspeak offers a complete and powerful desktop. The CD includes Flite, a free Text-To-Speech software available in English and French, but other languages might be included upon request. Oralux provides visually impaired users with the ability to peruse available documentation, send and receive email, browse the Internet and other common tasks.
The Oralux page...
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PCLinuxOS |
| PCLinuxOS is a community based non-profit distribution initially based on Mandrake Linux. Just think of it as Mandrake Linux enhanced by Texstar on a single bootable live CD with 1.5GB of desktop applications and the ability to install right to your hard drive with everything ready to work out of the box. NVIDIA drivers, Flash, Java, urpmi setup, and of course all the cool application updates by Texstar. And if we get all the bugs out of the mklivecd program then YOU can make your own Mandrake-style bootable CD as well.
The PCLinuxOS page...
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Plan-B |
| Plan-B is a bootable Linux environment without the need for a hard drive, it runs entirely in ram or from the cd, based on a basic, stripped installation of Red Hat Linux and the fundamental workings of the SuperRescue CD. A list of tools and utilities are also included for projects such as:
- Forensics/Data Recovery
- System/Network Analysis and Security Scanning
- Temporary Network Device/Server
- IDS / NIDS System
- Network Status Report Creation
The Plan-B page...
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RPM Live Linux CD |
| RPM Live Linux CD is a 120MB RedHat-based distribution that runs completely from CD, fits into around 80MB of RAM and is nearly indistinguishable from a system installed on a hard disk. Features include hardware recognition at boot, samba, dhcpd, name, xinetd, and SSH servers, virtual terminals, PAM, etc. Useful for dedicated servers, routers, emergency systems, cluster nodes and such, it does not contain an X11 Server.
The RPM Live Linux CD page...
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Sentry Firewall CD |
| The Sentry Firewall CD-ROM is designed to be an easy to manage and configure CD-ROM based Linux operating system suitable for use in a firewall, IDS (Intrusion Detection System) or server environment. The system is designed to be immediately configurable for a variety of different operating environments via a configuration file located on a floppy disk, a local hard drive, and/or a network via HTTP(S), FTP, SFTP, or SCP. Currently, the system is based on a Slackware 9.0 installation. Various other packages and utilities have also been added to increase this system's functionality.
The Sentry Firewall CD page...
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SLAX - Live CD |
| SLAX - Live CD is a bootable CD containing Linux operating system, which runs directly from the CDROM. The live CD is based on Slackware Linux and is downloadable as an ISO image. The project also provides information ans scripts needed to build your own live CD. When your computer boots from the it, the Linux kernel image (vmlinuz) is loaded first. Then a 16 MB virtual disk (ramdisk) is created in your computer's RAM. Rootdisk image (initrd.gz) is copied into it and then mounted as a root filesystem. Large directories (like /usr, /opt, ...) are mounted directly from the CDROM (read only).
The SLAX - Live CD page...
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SULIX |
| SULIX is a Hungarian edition of the well-known Knoppix CD-based distribution. Its main features are usability, Hungarian language support, 'freshness' in terms of software updates and educational purpose. It can be used in schools, for IT education or even as a Linux 'migration tool', because it requires no installation and further configuration. It can be handed out to students for individual practicing at home. The name 'SULIX' comes from Hungarian: 'suli' means 'school' in child's language. SULIX is developed by a very small group of teachers in Hungary. While the distribution's main language is Hungarian, speakers of other languages can also use it. Development of a next release, which will include up-to-date versions of KDE, XFree86, etc. is in progress.
The SULIX page...
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SUSE Live-Eval |
| SUSE Linux has been producing its Live-Eval CDs since version 6.0 as a way for users to test its distribution, and their machine's hardware compatibility, without having to spend any money. Unlike SUSE's full distribution, the Live-Eval CD can be downloaded freely as an ISO image. It does however require that a hard disk be present on the test computer which means that its usefullness as a rescue or demo disk has been superceded by better products, such as Knoppix.
The SUSE Linux page...
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