Need opinion on what linux software to use

i need a good distro of linux so that i can use to read hdd that are fauiling that windows has a hard time reading

i normaly use puppy linux which is pretty good but it doesnt have built in usb 3.0  i was looking in to knoppix but i cant find a good copy of it and i no there is somthing better out there 

what do you all think?

Try this:

http://ubuntu-rescue-remix.org/node/640

i need one with a good gui not dos based

Well, no Linux is DOS based.

Do you want it as a Live distro or do you plan on installing it?

a live cd would be the best way i run windows 8.1 and i have stuff at work set up thru it

i no linux isent does base i was really busy at work and wasnt thinking that was my bad

 

Makulu, Korora, openSUSE, Mint, elementary os, Manjaro, Sabyon, etc... the list goes on. All are great, just choose what works best. For me, it's SUSE Factory...

Kali is my current favorite live distro

Data recovery and even disk carving tools are available on all repos, the distro doesn't matter. They are also available for Slackware (e.g. Puppy Wary or Racy). Puppy Wary is very limited because it's made for ultra old systems. Use Racy if you want more functionality out of the box. A similar Slackware-based distro that I really like is SalixOS, you might want to take a look at that. SalixOS has better compatibility with the Slackware sources.

There are few advanced tools with a GUI though, because of efficiency reasons. For most advanced tools, CLI just makes much more sense (because of precision and efficiency) and delivers better performance.

i will try racy since i no more about the puppy linux distro group then other groups of distros out there thanks you all for your help

one last question do you all no anything about knoppix at all is it any good b/c i want to try it the last job i was at used it but never had any hands on with it

Note: GUI = Graphical User Interface
          CLI = Command Line Interface
          DOS =  Disk Operating System 

thanks for the info :D

+1, look feel and overall ability of Kali live cannot be matched or at least hasn't yet.

Knoppix has been around for a very long time. It still has its use sometimes, but in general, the world has evolved, and there is little love left for distros that only carry a couple of hundred packages in their repo. Everything is about repo-size now, if you offer more packages, you have more success, hence the success of Arch and the AUR right now. People forget that you can compile anything on any distro, but yeah, times have changed, there is no arguing about something the majority of users doesn't seem to like that much, but that doesn't mean it's obsolete.

oh i see i guess i will stick to puppy since it has more packages and what not for it and i have had alot of success on getting files and stuff that customers wanted with puppy that a normal windows mechine cant do lol and my boss is impressed with what i can do with linux anyways so ya

i was reaserching some more on hdd recovery and i found kali website so im downloading it now so i can try it and see what i can do it with :D

I just use Mint or Ubuntu, both have a live environment and you *CAN* "install" software to the live environment if you have a decent amount of ram, no less then 2Gb and you should be ok, if you've got  or more GB then you wont have to worry. The "installed" software is only installed to the live environment in ram, it's gone if you reboot.

It's what I'm currently doing as I've got no laptop and no internet, so I take over one of the locked down Windows boxes in a community college's library with a Mint live DVD/USB and load stuff for later on to a USB stick. Least they have a half decent download pipe.

Why not http://www.sysresccd.org/

It sounds like it might be suited for your specific purpose.

Try this : http://www.linuxmint.com/download.php