[LBo] Distros...

[Allen]

Hi gang,

Swamped so I haven't been around much. Now I'm studying for my 
CISSP exam and then next month going for two more certs in 
penetration testing methodology. Plus the HMO I'm consulting at 
is, well I'm not sure the best way to put it so I'll just say it 
reminds me of the ancient Chinese curse: "May you live in 
interesting times." Mind you, it is a curse, not a blessing.

In any case I need to take a wireless laptop with me to the 
second two workshops on penetration testing. My old PIII HP's 
batteries are long dead and not cheap to replace so I bought a 
new - to me - T40 Thinkpad and I'm going nuts trying to figure 
out the distro I should use for an install and how to partition 
the space I have to do the Linux on the dual boot. For the moment 
I'm going to use Xubuntu although I've been using mostly OpenSuse 
for the last while on one of my desktops. It seems to be a bit 
bloated for for a laptop install.

The questions I have are:

	1) Xubuntu says a swap of 1 gig, but the old formula I
	   remember is 2x installed memory. I have a gig of
	   memory so should I really use a 2 gig swap?

	2) Xubuntu says only other partition needed one with a
	   mount point of /. Is this really the way to go or
	   should I have a partition for /boot as well? If so
	   how big, 128 meg?
	
	3) Back to the distro question. I do a lot of information
	   security analysis work, some pen testing/forensics,
	   and some just straight documentation/writing. I think
	   that I might want to use LiveCDs for the pen testing
	   and other forensics work as the tools are changing
	   regularly so burning a new CD to use keeps me up to
	   date with those tools. Then use the laptop installed
	   distro for the grunt work of writing, analysis,
	   process analysis stuff and use it to store the pen
	   test logs. Does this make sense? If so is Xubuntu a
	   good choice? Others I've looked at include PCLinuxOS,
	   rPath, gNewSense, BLAG and DSL. I've even thought of
	   going with PC-BSD. My real goal is stability with a
	   minimum of fuss and constant fiddling with updates.
	   Suggestions?

	4) Anybody familiar with the T40? I can't seem to figure
	   out how to boot from a USB key or such. The BIOS says
	   you have to enable the USB, but it doesn't say how.
	   It did come with a manual so does anyone have one that
	   I can get a copy of? Same for the original CDs.

Thanks,

Allen