there are programs which will image an entire OS drive to DVDs
norton ghost , acronis I belive and also Boot It NG >>> (has a free 30 day trial period >>>> print the manual our before using)
it will take about 6 - 8 dvds to back up a 40 gig drive
the main problem though as I expalined above is this
once you are ready with the new computer & you execute the image restore to the new hard drive in the new machine >>>>> you will immediately need to perform a win xp repair install to remove your old system drivers from the windows system or it will crash
this is no biggie
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XP...install.htm#RI