All in All, I no longer have a real OS. And my Xp key is all used up so that's a no go. And this Windows 7 install is only active for maybe a couple weeks. I want to go to Linux since #1, IT'S FREE.

But my problem is that I can't get the 5.0 LiveDVD to boot, or any other Linux Live CD for that matter. Something is wrong with my DVD Drive and it nothing can be mounted. The CD's boot and can't find the root block device, and because of it cannot mount any of the information needed for the Live DVD to function. So how am I supposed to install linux since you have to have a cd. I know the USB boot works for some. But I guess the USB Stick I have isn't bootable even though I can select it from my BIOS boot list. (I've tried already lol, I'm not just coming into this blind)
My real question is then, is there a way to restore a drive image, and install that way? Because I know you can do that with Mac's. If you create an image from your whole hard drive after the OS has been installed and what not the filesystem will be kept intact. So what about with linux? Couldn't someone make a small partition install linux and then make a Drive Image of it? Now I know a lot of people have different hardware so it might make it almost impossible for that image to be universal. But there might be a lot of generalized options you could use for the image that could later be changed by whoever needs special packages instead of just the generic.