IMPORTANT! Before you do anything else, download critical updates for XP. There are several, and, one that corrects some problems with file migration. When you're ready to migrate, search for that word in XP help and go to the 'Files and Settings Transfer Wizard'.

An XP feature you may like as much as I do is 'Hibernate'. When you are ready to shut down your machine for the day, you can hibernate all the settings and they'll pop back up just as you left them next time you fire up. If, when you shut down, you have a 'Stand-by' button on the left of the shut down options, press Shift and it'll change to 'Hibernate' for as long as you hold the shift key down. Click on it and your system will hibernate and turn off automatically.