Windows ME Reinstall

I have a five year old ABS Athlon system with 640MB RAM, 40 GB HDD, DVD
Drive, CD Burner, floppy, etc. I recently updated bios, then upgraded from
Windows ME to XP in order to use new software. My HP printer would not
install and between HP tech support and me and the possible failure of my old
HDD, we messed up my system enough that it made sense to reinstall. While at
it, I decided to replace the HDD. I removed the 40 GB drive, installed the
80 GB as the master and started off.

After a couple of botched attempts to get the Maxtor software to setup the
HDD, it finally did. When I tried to use my recovery disk and Windows disk
that came with my system, I got a error message stating that this version of
Windows could not be installed. SU0173.

All of my software either came with the computer or was purchased from Comp
USA, Staples, etc. and is legitimate.

My desire is to go back and reinstall ME to make sure that I would not lose
all of my initial software. How can I resolve the issue of the error message
and get ME to setup?

Thanks,

Bruce

(After I get it up and stable, I'll run the upgrade to XP again)