• c0mpost@lemmy.eco.br
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    1 year ago

    I’m not sure I know what you mean by diagnosing, but it’s usually a good idea to use the same distro you’re having trouble with.

  • chepdamona@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    Adding on to other suggestions, if you’re not aware of Ventoy it’s a very handy tool. Using it you can have a USB drive with several live images on it which you can choose at boot time. Great for quick testing, just drop an ISO in a folder!

    • SocialDoki@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      1 year ago

      Seconded for that. Parted Magic is so nice that when they went paid, I ponied up immediately, which is saying something from my cheap ass.

  • bamboo@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    I’ve gotten good mileage out of just an Ubuntu live image. If the network is working you can install packages via apt like normal, but they include a lot of the basics already.

  • aion@feddit.de
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    1 year ago

    depends on what you are looking for. grml and kali are linux distros that focus on diagnosing.

    • Case@unilem.org
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      1 year ago

      Kali was built out as a penetration testing distro, though it does contain some diagnostic tools.

      Not a bad place to start if you’re used to Debian, but it is a rolling release so it may break unexpectedly, or have new bugs introduced with each update.

      A persistent USB with just Debian could have all the same tools installed but have a longer support scope on releases so you don’t have to update daily (bleeding edge) which is nice to reduce read/writes to the flash drive it’s on.

      That being said, I keep a Kali live image (persistent) but thats becauae its home - my first introduction to Linux was 5 minutes with Red Hat, but aside from a brief intro in highschool, I really started with Linux in Backtrack, offensive security’s predecessor to Kali.

      Yes, I have to learn things the hard way lol.

  • deadcatbounce@reddthat.com
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    1 year ago

    Console ArchLinux every time. Create a USB instance and then load up what you need.

    You don’t need a GUI.

    • Norah - She/They@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOP
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      1 year ago

      You don’t need a GUI.

      Thanks for your opinion, but you don’t get to decide what I need. I wanted a simple distro that I was familiar with, so that I could teach it to someone with basic computer knowledge. Teaching how to use a terminal was outside the scope.