Just pointing out that "Abandonware" isn't an official designation, its something websites made up to justify essentially the PC equivalent of rom downloads. So yeah its a means of playing games but we probably shouldn't give people the impression its legal.
One reason I ask about Windows XP specifically BTW is because I already have a separate comp that does a lot of older Win98 and DOS games (and Dosbox runs on anything really), I was wondering if there was anything on XP specifically that made it worthwhile.
I have found a few--Doom 3 (not the BFG Edition tho--that requires later hardware. Original Doom 3 will run fine tho), the later Myst games, freeware puzzler Hex-a-hop, the freeware ports of the Marathon trilogy (they're supposed to run on Windows 98 but in my experience they refused to).... I've also gotten a lot of mileage out of my XP desktop as a video-watching machine.