Live CDs don't work in my computer

[clueo8]

I've been trying to mess around with some live CDs and they just hang during load up of any distro. I have tried Kubuntu, Ubuntu, and currently I'm trying PClinuxOS... On their site, I tried boot commands like safeboot (which finally showed me some text output, rather then a stuck loading bar). It seemed to have stopped loading with the last line reading "Loading basic CDROM modules for Kernel 2.6". Its not the burnt CDs, it works on older PCs... Thanks in advance!

I think its my hardware. Heres my specs:

ASUS P4P800SE
P4 3.0e
1GB RAM DDR GSKill
2x SATA 300GB Seagates
1x IDE 120GB Maxtor
NEC DVD+/-RW
Samsung DVD+/-R

Some other things I noticed were "hda: lost intercept"

[oosterhouse]

Try Knoppix, it has great hardware detection.

[mechmaster]

DSL is a great little one that can be used to do alot in too. It also detects a bunch of hardware.

-mechmaster

[irlandes]

Grrr! I just typed in a response, and when I hit Post Quick Reply, it changed from logged in to logged out, and dumped my posting I really hate that.

it is common when someone asks for help on a problem for other posters to suggest their favorite distro instead of helping. the problem here is that you have already tried three liveCD's that normally work great.. So suggesting another time consuming download and burning other CD's does not seem like a logical first choice. Althought if you have another computer you have plenty of time to play while you download all these other iso's.

In pclinuxos when it comes up there is a boot: prompt. You can hit enter, which has not worked for you, or you can type:

livecd

Then a space then various cheat codes, to try a few basic things.

http://www.pclinuxonline.com/wiki/CheatCodes

is the page which lists most basic cheat codes for pclinuxos.

Try for example,

livecd nousb noscsi

and see if that helps any.

Did you check the md5sum of your CD's? There is an md5sum checker of Windows if yo are stuck there.

By coincidence, I just tried pclinuxos v. 0.92 (I think it is) today, and it worked much better than either Knoppix or Kanotix Cebit.

And, though Knoppix has a very loyal following, Kanotix is noticeably better, but also support is also better. Knoppix.org has several very surly members and moderator, and Kano himself at times helps on his forum. Once I mentioned a certain odd video card on an older computer wouldn't work and he tried to help, I noted the next verson he added the driver for that video card.

[j-unplugged]

dsl, knoppix, centos, slax, and pclinuxos have all booted on at least one of my pc's. and a couple of old ones also boot but not livecd: redhat 5.2 and caldera from y2k.