SuSE recently made their SuSE Linux 9.1 Live-Eval version available for download.  You simply download the ISO image (about 675 megabytes), burn the image to a CD, and then boot a computer from that CD.  SuSE Linux 9.1 comes up, letting you give Linux a try without having to install anything to your hard drive.

I downloaded the Live CD image to my SuSE 9.1 Professional system last night, and this evening K3b, the CD Kreator, made quick work of burning the image to a CD.  I put the CD in my Dell Latitude laptop and rebooted.  I didn’t have to answer a single prompt during the boot process, and in about the same time it takes to boot a Windows install CD, I had a working Linux system running.  Everything’s done on the CD or in a RAM drive.  It’s stunning.  Just beautiful.  I can browse the Web, work with OpenOffice applications, check email, play games, and even mount my Windows shares so that I could store files over there.  I should be able to mount the laptop’s hard drive, but I haven’t figured out how to do that yet.  I also need to see if I can mount my 256 MB Memorex USB thumb drive.  With the SuSE Live CD and a workable thumb drive, I could work on just about any modern system.