intersted in Linux - advice please?

I have a Packard Bell desktop pc with Windows 98 on it. It has a 10
gig hd, less than 100 meg ram, a dvd player and an out-of-date speed
CD writer that won't read current disks. I'd reinstalled Win 98
foolishly without thinking about drivers, and now there are those
yellow blobs all over DEvice Manager. I can't get this machine
online
that easily because I don't have a phone line at home, etc. I've
become curious about Linux and wonder if this pc would be capable of
running it, but then what do I do about those drivers? Does Linux
use
the same ones as Windows? Could I make this into a satisfactory
system? I'd mainly use it for watching DVDs and wordprocessing,
hopefully with some kind of compatibility with my V*sta laptop, even
if its just txt files. I want to replace the monitor with something
recent and flat-screenish and replace the old CD writer.

all advice and links appreciated.

.

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