Another thing to consider is the many USB stick utilities. They take a bootable CD ISO and convert it into a bootable USB image. You can still store files on it as well. Very handy for trying stuff out, and usually much faster to boot.
Assumes your PC will boot from USB via bios. If not use one of the universal boot CD's, which then daisy chain to the bootable USB image. UUnetbootin is the utility on the linux side, but there is a similar (and free) utility for windows as well. Just google "bootable USB iso" or similar. Have fun, Alan km4ba
