I'm agreeing with Raptor here. Methinks beginners would be a little better off with a couple of virtual dishcloths (anti-virus, anti-spyware etc) than the "pour industrial strength bleach all over everything - that'll kill all the germs" tactic.
merlin, Windows ME is four years old now (at least). It's not weird that Microsoft quit supporting it - it's good business sense.
And boys, if you're so worried about all this Palladium malarky, there are hundred's of Linux distro's avaliable for free on the internet...