Hardware and distro decision assistance

[Nichod]

Summary of my hardware:

Processor:
Phenom-9550 (A) 2.2 GHz (95W)
2000 MHz HyperTransport 1.0
Socket AM2+

Chipset:
GeForce 9100

Motherboard:
Manufacturer: Pegatron
Motherboard Name: M2N78-LAHP/Compaq
motherboard name: Violet-GL8E

Hard drive:
640 GB SATA 3G (3.0 Gb/sec)
7200 rpm

DVD+/-R/RW 16X 12X +/-DL LS 12X RAM SuperMulti SATA drive

Sound/Audio:
High Definition 8-channel audio
ALC 888S chipset

Detailed specs from HP: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...roduct=3853840

I've tried the Snow Leopard HAZARD edition. And it results in my system looping through a reboot/restart process. I've also tried iAtkos v7 and it boots to the Apple logo, but then it just stays there and a crossout sign appears.

I'd like to get Snow Leopard working, but I think it would be more reasonable to get Leopard working and then install Snow Leopard at a later date on another hard drive.