The machine on which I have loaded Linux is an old, well used one. Its specs are as follows:
- Intel Celeron Mendocino 333 MHz Processor
- 256 Kb Cache
- 98 MB SDRAM, 100MHz FSB Speed
- Aztec 2320 ISA SoundCard
- Samsung Samtron 40Bn 14" Colour Monitor
- Microsoft 3 Button Scroll IntelliMouse
- Microtek 102 Button Keyboard
- Mercury MS-440 Speakers
- Samsung 52x CD Drive
- Floppy Drive 3.5"
I have set the machine to dual boot between Windows 98 and RedHat Fedora Core 2 (Kernel Version 2.6.5-1.358). The Boot Loader is GRUB. I use windows basically for connecting to the Internet and checking my mail.
Linux is set to boot into runlevel 3. Linux is used basically for doing productive work like Writing a document in Open Office, spreadsheets, Image Editing using Gimp and so on.
I use Gnome 2.6 as the window manager. But I also have a liking for Fluxbox which is a light weight windowmanager which uses far less resources than Gnome and KDE. And I like fluxbox for its simplicity and speed. 
This Screenshot (Image size 151kb) shows Gnome 2.6 with spatial nautilus view, Gimp, XTerm and Program listing.Clicking on the thumbnail image, will open the image a new window.