You really should stop using 98, it's just a big pain in your caveman ass, when you want to do anything....especially if you don't like re-booting a lot.
Really, not in my experience; my box has the lid off more than on from tinkering, and yet I rarely have a crash under 98SE. I'm only considering this because I got an incredible deal on some hardware, I can get XP with a $60.00 rebate, and I do have a video corruption I can't seem to fix on my old system. Should be an interesting learning experience, tho.