Check out Ubuntu, an increasingly popular Linux distribution for desktop PCs. The latest stable version, 6.06, boots off a CD to give you a preview of the system. You can download an image file (almost 700 megabytes from http://www.ubuntu.com) and burn a CD using a program like Nero.

Three years ago, I tried another Linux distribution called Knoppix that worked pretty much the same way. The neat thing about live CDs, as they are called, is that you don't need to install anything to get started. Simply stick in the CD and boot from it and you're ready to go.

A live CD is great, too, for testing if an operating system will recognize the hardware you have. And, in those instances where your operating system crashes, a live CD can be a useful recovery tool as well.

There are limitations to booting from a CD, however.

First, because you're running off a read-only medium, you can't really customize the system to your liking. All changes you make during one session will be lost the next time you boot from the CD. Also, running off a CD is much slower than having the system boot from the hard disk.

The neat twist to the Ubuntu live CD, however, is that it puts an installer icon on the desktop that enables you to set up the operating system to boot off your hard disk instead.

For some time, local Ubuntu enthusiasts like Dave Asuncion, who works for the city government of Gerona, Tarlac, and free and open source evangelist Clair Ching have piqued my interest in this version of Linux.

Designed for usability, Ubuntu takes its name from the South African concept of "humanity toward others." The live CD even has a short video of Nelson Mandela talking about the African tradition of community and sharing.

Ubuntu's development is sponsored by Canonical Ltd., a private company that South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth founded to promote free software projects.

Shuttleworth gained worldwide fame in April 2002 as a civilian cosmonaut aboard the Russian Soyuz TM-34 mission, paying about $20 million for the opportunity. He spent eight days on the International Space Station, participating in experiments related to AIDS and genome research, before returning to Earth.

"The sight of the Earth from space is breathtaking, and life changing. Three minutes in space will change your perspective, I guarantee, on the way we treat one another and the world," he told Slashdot three years later.

What a cool story, I thought, as I contemplated the install icon. Double-clicking on it, I overcame years of resistance to installing Linux on my home PC because I didn't want to risk screwing up my existing Windows system and other files.

But as far as Linux installers go, the one that comes with Ubuntu 6.06 is pretty easy to use. In fact, the first few screens flew by so quickly I was beginning to wonder what the fuss was all about.

Then I hit the screen about disk partitioning. Call it a personal weakness, but if there's one thing that intimidates the heck out of me, it's messing with a hard disk. Suddenly, the easy choices were replaced with options like: "Resize IDE1 master, partition #4 (hda5) and use freed space" and dire warnings that all data in the partitions chosen would be wiped clean.

Crossing my fingers that I got it right, I plowed ahead.

It was a tense 20 minutes as I watched the orange progress bar inch toward 100 percent. Then it was all over and I rebooted the PC. Would my Windows installation and data survive?

I breathed a sigh of relief when I found they had, and only then did I begin exploring the new operating system on my dual-boot PC.

First impressions: Ubuntu is slick and clean, and comes with programs that most users will need to start working: the OpenOffice.org suite that works much like Microsoft Office; the Firefox browser; Gimp, an image manipulation program in the vein of Photoshop; and a number of multimedia applications to play music and videos.

Old Windows dogs like me will have to get accustomed to the Linux file system and the different way that software is installed. If the spirit of Ubuntu is alive, however, there ought to be a lot of help from the community along the way.