I've got a "new" Toshiba Satellite Pro 4340 laptop. It came without HDD (now it has a 10 Gb one), and I've expanded it to 256 Mb RAM. This is the list of devices of that laptop:

100:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX/DX - 82443BX/ZX/DX Host bridge [8086:7190] (rev 03)
200:01.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 440BX/ZX/DX - 82443BX/ZX/DX AGP bridge [8086:7191] (rev 03)
300:05.0 Bridge [0680]: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 ISA [8086:7110] (rev 02)
400:05.1 IDE interface [0101]: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 IDE [8086:7111] (rev 01)
500:05.2 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 USB [8086:7112] (rev 01)
600:05.3 Bridge [0680]: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 ACPI [8086:7113] (rev 03)
700:07.0 Communication controller [0780]: Agere Systems 56k WinModem [11c1:0441] (rev 01)
800:09.0 IRDA controller [0d00]: Toshiba America Info Systems FIR Port Type-DO [1179:0d01]
900:0b.0 CardBus bridge [0607]: Toshiba America Info Systems ToPIC100 PCI to Cardbus Bridge with ZV Support [1179:0617] (rev 20)
1000:0b.1 CardBus bridge [0607]: Toshiba America Info Systems ToPIC100 PCI to Cardbus Bridge with ZV Support [1179:0617] (rev 20)
1100:0c.0 Multimedia audio controller [0401]: Yamaha Corporation YMF-744B [DS-1S Audio Controller] [1073:0010] (rev 02)
1201:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: S3 Inc. 86C270-294 Savage/IX-MV [5333:8c12] (rev 11)
1306:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ [10ec:8139] (rev 10) 

(The network card is a PCMCIA one)

So let's talk about software. I've installed Windows 98SE, all the drivers from Toshiba site and nusb USB generic mass storage driver. I'm going to use it with a Willem EPROM burner and some serial devices (and maybe some gaming). I was thinking about installing the software for the EPROM burner, Putty, Abiword 2.4.6 (to open text documents), PDF Creator 1.7.3 (my printer has no drivers for Windows 98 SE) and some kind of PDF viewer. I'd need some lightweight web browser that works in Windows 98.

My questions:
- I've installed Windows 98SE without any update. Can it be updated via Windows Update? Would you update it or leave it alone?
- Do you recommend any specific driver version for the video and audio card, or can I leave the Toshiba ones?
- What more software do you recommend for this computer? I guess I'll need to open some .odt and Microsoft Office files.
- Do you think this computer is fully DOS compatible? I was thinking about booting Windows 98SE without the GUI to play some games, but I'm not sure if that Yamaha sound card would be compatible. I don't know if it has SB-link (if it has it connected, is a trace on the laptop board), or what software would I need to enable sound in DOS.
- Would you do a "full" (I mean, dual booting) DOS / Windows 98SE installation or would be enough using F8 to boot from command line?
- Maybe I'll need to boot it on LInux at some times. I was thinking of using Puppy Linux, but I don't know what releases would be bes (from a usability / performance view). It was "shipped" (it found it on the CD) with Puppy 5.2.8 but maybe it was too heavy for that computer. I'm pretty sure that Puppy 6.x (the most up-to-date releases) would be slow, so what version would you recommend?

Thanks in advance.