I am normally running the second computer on a wireless network, with a USB network adapter, but because the computer running the router and the cable modem crashed, I temporarily moved my machine into that room and connected it to the cable modem, which of course is hard-wired into the wall. I am running Windows most of the time, but for a few things, I briefly ran Knoppix, and was amazed to see it immediately detect and start running...not the network in this case, but the cable modem internet connection (ethernet? I don't know) with my doing nothing whatsoever to set it up--I wasn't even going to try, because I supposed either it wouldn't work or I would have to spend some time figuring out what to do. On Windows, even to get online with the cable modem and without the router, I'd expect to do *something.(

As far as I am aware, all distributions of Linux will configure eth(x) (eth being your ethernet or network card) to work with your active cable modem. The only difference is Knoppix has eliminated the need for the user interaction in getting online.

[QUOTE=The only difference is Knoppix has eliminated the need for the user interaction in getting online.[/QUOTE]

That was enough to impress me.