Thanks, guys. Which bootable Linux distro do you recommend? The only one I can remember using is Knoppix, I think.
And Attack, I've heard of Hiren's, but when I go to that page you link to I can't for the life of me find out how to actually download it! It's basically just a long page of text with no links anywhere...
UNetbootin is a very cool application that has the option to download several different Linux distros and make a Bootable Live USB drive. You will want to pick the live versions of whatever distro you want to try.
It is very odd that they don't have a DL link on the site. This was the second link when I googled for "Hiren's BootCD 15.1"
http://www.softexia.com/hirens-bootcd.html