Will it boot without problems?
No.
It will complain about every missing device and have to install drivers for every new device. By device I'm talking about everything down to chipset level support, on board USB, brand of IDE or SATA controller, etc. If you are switching brands of video cards, or generations, there is a good chance you'll end up in Safe Mode with a low resolution screen (until you fix it up).
Unless it is an identical or near identical motherboard (which by "new system" I'm guessing it is not), all these changes will probably invoke a WGA reactivation. This may not need involve calling Microsoft, you may be able to do it by typing in the XP license code, assuming you have a retail Windows XP and not an OEM version installed by the manufacturer. Even there you may (or may not) have a chance if you move between like manufacturers, that is, from an HP to an HP or a Dell to a Dell.
If you move (say) from a Dell to an Asus M/B, chances are poor reactivation will be accepted.
That being said, I have had very good luck reactivating my retail copies of XP over several motherboard upgrades, both by moving a system disk or by reinstalling fresh.
2This questions and answers are true for Windows XP due to it's driver architecture, although for Windows Vista and Windows 7 they aren't true. I have used my system disk in three laptops before this one and haven't reinstalled it ever. The only thing I would need to change would be the disk controllers if that differs between the two computers (eg. Intel VS nForce), but all the rest is automatically detected... :-) – Tamara Wijsman – 2010-08-10T13:03:05.997
Duplicate question: http://superuser.com/questions/173102/what-do-i-do-with-windows-after-making-a-new-computer-with-an-old-hard-drive
– Tamara Wijsman – 2010-08-10T13:13:32.657