I just finished installing Ubuntu 10.10 on my XP desktop, and i'm already IN LOVE with it! But i did have to dual-boot because i have some stuff/programs that aren't linux friendly. Besides that, It's amazing!
Linux is pretty slick! I have gotten away from it for desktop use, but I still use it to backup all my machines and share files.
I put it on my virtual machine to play around with it Whats the benefits of it? For me XP does everything I need