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Pursuant to which, I now maintain the Linux Distributions HOWTO (at http://sunsite.unc.edu/mdw/HOWTO/Distribution-HOWTO.html), to which you should go for further information.
Despite Linux's reputation as an ever-mutating hacker's playground, I've found it to be less trouble to run and administer than the commercial System V release I used to use. And it has more nifty features than any commercial version I've used or seen, including fun things like sound card support. And it's cheap. And you get complete sources for everything.
The commercial Linux distributions all cost about $25 to $50. If you're too cheap to pay even $25, or don't have a CD-ROM drive, it is possible to download a free Linux distribution over the Internet from FTP archives like metalab, including disk images for floppies you can create locally and then boot and load from.