I can only impart my experience here and nothing more, but maybe it will provide some guidance for you.
I stepped away from my Amiga and computers in general back in 98 thinking computers won't be as fun as they used to be(I was wrong on this point, but didn't realize until recently). I picked it back up in 03 and have been running XP then 7. They did what I needed them to do, minor music production and duplication, very few games, web browsing, iTunes, and Office work.
About 2 years ago I wanted to try something a little safer for my family in regards to security, privacy, and stability. I ultimately moved to Linux Mint LXDE/Mate for everyone after trying several "distros". It provides a platform for music production with Ardour and Audacity; it has multiple options for CD and DVD duplication; I use my Playstation or 1200 for games now
even though Neverwinter Nights is an awesome RPG with a native Linux client; Libre Office does everything I used MS Office for, and Firefox seems to be updated weekly. I haven't tried to figure out an iTunes replacement yet but it's not a high priority for me at this point.
I have had mixed results but a lot has to do with the learning curve on my part. Fortunately, there is a ton of documentation on the net, support is there for those who can search forums, go on youtube for tutorials, etc.
Getting the desktop running with pre-installed software is cake and getting additional software not included is just as easy. I never had anything "break" until I really started messing with things in attempts to learn and I wasn't really knowledgeable as to what I was doing. I know better now.
but that's part of the "fun" so to say (at least for me)
One thing that I have realized is that I feel a little excited again. Almost like when I first started using the Amiga. I have even started a new partition for Linux from Scratch and have started reading up on C+. There are fun hacks out there, different ways to implement the OS, different desktops, options in general are varied. Mint itself is fast, works on older hardware, and has a great support and development team.
Me personally, I like using Linux and use it
everyday. It is different in some ways and will take some time to learn, but once you do, it affords you a well supported alternative.
If you want to dual boot, this is an option as is the USB stick. There are also "live" cds, but these provide a generally poor experience due to the nature of system access. If you don't want to mess with your hard drive yet, go with the USB stick.
Flame on