.... That's the headline on a featured story on c|net. According the to the reporter, the answer is "complicated." I just finished working through an entirely different proposition.
Recently, I upgraded the OS on a couple of the family computers and this required me to buy Windows XP, and while I was at it, but threw in a store-bought copy of Linux. No complaints about XP. I got what I paid for and upgraded all the computers the license would allow. Then, my nine-year-old daughter, 
for reasons I'm still not sure I understand, "needed" a computer. So, still having an ancient notebook computer stashed in a bin in my lab, I bought a copy of Xandros (which was the Linux of the moment when I bought it) and decided to see what would happen. I just couldn't face paying more money on an OS, especially if I wasn't even sure it would work on the computer I'm installing it on.
It installed very easy. All the apps installed very easy. I even found some age / grade level appropriate educational apps that are useful. It recognized the wireless card and joined the home network ... very easy. The user interface is ... very easy, easy enough for a nine-year-old to navigate. I am quite pleased and would do it again. And I paid what's considered a premium price ($65.00) for a free OS. I bought a "free" OS because I wasn't confident enough I could make a boot disk on my own and didn't have the time to waste learning how.
So, now I the family is running three operating systems -- for the time being. If I ever had to build another "wintel" machine, I would have to seriously question the "win" part.
