[vox-tech] Need some help choosing a linux flavor for an old laptop

[Kyle Oliveira]

I'm helping a friend upgrade an old Inspiron 3000 so she can check email
and do Word documents while she's in France. I decided to run linux as the
OS since I've heard it's more efficient that windows in that sort of
situation and I've kinda narrowed it down to three options: cAos (because
it's supposedly good with older hardware), MEPIS (same reason, plus I heard
it does networking stuff well), and Mandriva (simply because Matloff's
walkthrough is easily available). I was wondering which one would be the
best to install considering:
*The laptop is running on a Pentium I with 128 MB of RAM. It also has a
*blank* 30 GB hard drive
*There is no RJ-45 port, per se - we have a USB to RJ 45 adaptor and a
PCMCIA 56k modem
*The installation needs to be fairly easy, she's already in France with all
the equipment. I'll probably be leading her through the installation
through some sort of written walkthrough (if you know where to get one,
that'd be nice too) and talking on the phone.

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I'm hoping to send
out CD's by the end of the week, but if someone could point me in the right
 direction I might not have to burn CD's for all three just as fall backs
in case one doesn't work.

Thanks!