So how much can I make with a normal single PC in a day or 2? say a dual core 3.0Ghz machine,
Depending on your graphics card (the CPU is useless for mining), you might make a penny or two per day, minus the increased electricity cost of constantly running your computer at full load. Unless you have very cheap electricity, you'll be making a net
loss.
Is it more feasible to collect bitcoins through free bitcoin advertising sites or to mine them yourself?
Probably, unless you're willing to spend some money on more specialised mining equipment (FPGAs or ASICs).
Also where can I buy bitcoins in stupidly small amounts like £1 (GBP), £5 etc? Does a service for this exist yet?
Don't know, sorry.
Also when you print bitcoin money it has the private key on it right? does the printing of that private key compromise the whole wallet or just that payment address?
If you're talking about a paper backup of your wallet, allowing anyone else to see it compromises the whole wallet. If you're talking about
PrintCoins or
Casascius coins and other such things intended to be circulated as cash, then only the address is "compromised", but you
want it to be compromised: the idea is that people who receive such bills and coins can use the private key to transfer the bitcoins to their (digital) wallet, after which the bill/coin is worthless and is taken out of circulation.
and what effect does it have on the blockchain, will people printing bitcoins and taking them out of digital circulation ultimately ruin bitcoin?
The blockchain will have fewer transactions, as people conduct some transactions offline, but the bitcoins won't stay offline forever (see above). You might as well ask, "Will people withdrawing cash from their bank accounts ultimately ruin banks?", to which the answer is no, because the cash almost always gets deposited again at some point. Note also that lost or destroyed bitcoins are not a problem, as this simply has the result of increasing the value of all remaining bitcoins (slightly decreased supply + same demand), and bitcoins can be divided to 8 decimal places. Even if so many bitcoins were lost that only a tiny fraction of a bitcoin remained, the economy would still function just fine on that fraction of a bitcoin.