Trying Ubuntu desktop with the family

My family has a computer in the kitchen which we use for looking things up on the Internet, playing music through Pandora, watching YouTube videos, and Facebooking.  When guests come to the house, they'll often use it for checking email and many of the same things my family uses it for.  It has been running Windows 7 for some time.  A couple days ago, it started acting like it had a virus or had memory going bad.  I mucked around with it for a while (sound familiar?) and wasn't able to fix it.  I was growing increasingly frustrated (sound familiar?), but then I had an idea.  Considering what we use it for, why not just slap Ubuntu desktop on it?  I could run the live CD version for a while, see how the family likes it, and if everything goes well, eventually install it on the HDD, replacing Windows.  I ran into one snag with the video card drivers where the CD was spinning, but the screen was blank.  I found a solution on journalxtra.com (thank you).  So now, I've got Ubuntu 10.10 running on the kitchen computer.  We'll see how the family likes it and I'll let you know what happens.