What to do with XP?

[Beren3000]

Originally Posted by Alcuin

Beren3k (Do you mind if I call you that? It seems like a nice nickname…),

Not at all, it is a nice nickname

Originally Posted by Alcuin

I’d like those links for PlayOnLinux and Wine

Actually PlayOnLinux is simply a more user-friendly front-end for Wine (when you install it, it installs Wine as one of its dependencies). This article has a good tutorial on how you can do it. The only thing I would do differently from the article is that you shouldn't download the PlayOnLinux .deb from the link they offer you. Grab it from the repos instead:

sudo apt-get install playonlinux

This way, if it is ever upgraded by the maintainers, Ubuntu will detect these upgrades and offer to upgrade it for you.

If you want to give Wine a spin (without using PlayOnLinux), this article has a nice tutorial.

Originally Posted by Alcuin

Must I reinstall all the MS Office products

I'm afraid so. There's now way around this that I know of.