Colonial Campaigns Club (CCC)

After seven years (!) with my old machine I have finally come round to order a new one. I am moving from 1 GB RAM to 4 GB and also from Win XP Pro to Vista Home 32 bit. Now question: Will I be alright with most applications if I just copy them from one computer to the other (via external HD)? Obviously re-installing all the stuff, including quite old software on a quite new OS, will be much more of a bother, not to mention finding (!), re-downloading and installing all patches, updates, mods, graphics add-ons and you name it that have gathered over the years.

Also, is there any benefit in keeping an older OS (I don't have XP on a disk, but Win 2K with which I was always quite happy) on a smaller partition (I will have 640 GB total and am presently using about 60 GB, so there is enough space on that disk to build a spaceship in it) or an external drive for use with older software? I am specifically thinking of the BG games which I understand could be a problem on Vista. (Although I read somewhere that the 32 bit version should be OK with 16 bit applications?)

Well, any comments and help most welcome. It's been, well, seven years since I last set up a new machine. I am quite rusty in this department! [8)]