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I had similar lack of knowledge and experience issues back when I first started down the linux/*BSD path, and it can be quite intimidating to a newcomer to *nix-based OSs.

Fortunately, these days it is much easier to get a handle on basic linux and *BSD operation/configuration/etc. There are now many excellent LiveCD distributions out there, including both linux and FreeBSD (FreeSBIE project).

They allow a newcomer to experience an operational, mostly configured system without risking your existing OS and data, and get familiar with it, and most can be installed to a hard drive while saving the configurations that were auto-detected by the LiveCD startup.

There are many flavors of linux LiveCD distributions out there like Knoppix http://www.knoppix.net/ and even "specialty" LiveCDs like P.H.L.A.K.(Professional Hackers Linux Assault Kit) http://www.phlak.org/ or Auditor http://new.remote-exploit.org/index.php/Auditor_ma in and for FreeBSD there is FreeSBIE http://www.freesbie.org/ which gave me my leg-up with the steep part of the learning curve for FreeBSD (the developers at #freesbie on Azzura.net on IRC are helpful and friendly!).

Good luck, hope that helps!

Strat

Do you mean this little fellow?

bonzai!

Does anyone know of a CD distro that offers Tripwire or similar MD5 based integrity utility standard?

PHLAK linux has AIDE, which is similar to Tripwire. It's also a fairly handy diagnostic distro. Tool list here; PHLAK tools

Whaooo....
a new reason to upgrade my graphics card to some thing upto date instead of being content with always using crap that's 3 years old.

Now when I upgrade to Longhorn I'll just have to buy an new *eww* pre-built computer just to be running the latest and greatest OS on the Market.

</sarcasm>

I mean Windows. I shall now go throw out my 15 versions of Linux on CD's (like MandrakeMove and P.H.L.A.K.) and go pay Microsoft every penny they deserve for 4 years of hard work the put in to making this wonderful OS

</kissing_M$_a$$>

I make it most of my life giving new life to old hardware. I use Windows 2000 Professional as an OS of choice. I personally use a 700mhz Intel Celeron (Coppermine) processor( though I prefer AMD) and a ATI Radeon 7500 Dual-Head. I get most of my hardware for "free". I've paid for a graphics card and a hard drive for my own personal machine. All the extra hardware i get i refurbish and give to those know need a computer.

This just burns me when I know that I have to upgrade to be anywhere near safe. Scratch that. Unless a firewall and common-sense about network security doesn't protect me in 2006 on the internet, I don't know why I'll even use it casually except for "Google"ing whatever, placing Holds on books at my local library, and updating my drivers/software/OS

Yah gotta love oligopies and near-monopolies

Security minded live distro. Phlak.

Oh dear. You don't say that it has a CD-ROM so MandrakeMove, Knoppix, and PHLAK are all out of the question. *sigh*
And they are so easy to use too... :'(
Oh well.....A USB-CDROM boot option in the BIOS looks promising.

http://www.phlak.org/

Seems to be down currently, tho...

busted link for future reference

Check out Phlak.
It's fairly polished and can be used for a whole lot more than just removing spyware. I'd highly suggest checking it out.

Oh, and it uses XFce4, which I think is just a damn cool alternative to KDE and Gnome. XFce4 + Slackware 9.1 is a great combination for older computers that just get bogged down by KDE and Gnome.

The purpose of the live CD is not as your actual OS. It is used for testing the operating system to see if it works correctly with your hardware. I have also used P.H.L.A.K (A lighweight, hackery live CD also, like knoppix based on debian)for disaster recovery on windows systems. It works quite well.

phlak, although based on Morphix it has just about every security utility you could imagine.

I think that this is what PHLAK might be using with it's desktop=sneaky option.