I'm planning to pick up a cheap pc and upgrade to linux in an effort to learn about it. I've been looking at red hat 9 or mandrake 9. Can any of the more experienced users on the board enlighten me on the pros or cons of either distribution? Would going back to mandrake 8 be a better choice for "learning" sake? i'm really thinking of using this as a pc to play with in an effort to learn linux with a view to move core apps to it if i get hooked. anything in terms of system requirements i should keep in mind?

Many thanks