Windows ME is a bug, plain and simple as that. I've actually grown to like the Win 9X systems (I was one of those who strongly resisted the pressure to upgrade from Windows 3.11 to Windows 95 way back when), and have come to the conclusion that ME is useless.

I have to ask, though, why would you have to pay someone to upgrade to XP? I haven't tried an XP install, but I haven't had any problems re-installing 98SE...