A number of XP machines run hardware that's not compatible with Calibre 2.x and would not work no matter if Linux was installed. The best thing to do is run the MS Windows 8.1 Upgrade Adviser to see if the system is capable of running Windows 8.1 64-bit. if it is, upgrade to Windows 10 64-bit and then you can install Calibre 2.x.
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkId=321548