Sony Picturebook and CD-ROM?

Hi everyone! I just registered. Good techie forums are few and far between these days. The Usenet has been crap since 1998... so many porn ads its pathetic.
Anyway I'll looking into the Sony Picturebook. I just ebayed my Inspiron. I'm so sick of lugging around these huige things, and I think the Sony Picturebook is the way I want to go.

How does the CD-ROM connect to the PC? I know its external, but would a normal set of generic (Oak?) Drivers work with it? I'd like to load WIndows 2000 on one, but I don't know if it would boot from the CD-ROM or floppy? Would the Oak drivers see a USB CD-ROM?