I purchased a computer about a year ago. Windows Vista was still vaporware
at the time so the manufacturer installed Windows XP on the computer with the
promise that I would be due a free "Express Ugrade" Disk to Windows Vista
Business. After About 6 months I finally received my "Express Upgrade" Disk.
I later bought the "Windows Anytime Upgrade" to Windows Vista Ultimate.

The hard drive went bad last week. I tried to reinstall Windows on a new
hard drive using my "Express Upgrade" disk to perform a clean install.
Everything looked like the installation went well. I then used my "Windows
Anytime Upgrade" to upgrade to Ultimate. Everything looked all right during
the process. I then installed all my programs over the next two days. Still
no problems arose. Last Friday I started getting message windows stating that
I needed to Activate my Windows. Since my activation key is embedded in the
Windows_Anytime_Upgrade.slupkg-ms XrML Digital License Package file, I
tried to activate by phone. The technician I talked to told me that I first
needed to install my Windows XP, then install my Windows Express Upgrade,
then my Windows Anytime Upgrade. Even though I was extremely angry that I
should have to spend two days reinstalling my Windows Vista and all my other
software, I decided to give it a try. What else can I do? I gave it a try
but Windows XP would not find my hard drive since the partitioning of Windows
Vista is different than Windows XP. The hard drive still has the
non-activated Windows Vista on it.

How can I either get an activation key that will work, or at least install
Windows Vista Ultimate with the least trouble?

Stuart J. Cohen

Hi,

Call back, tell'em you installed XP first and upgraded, they won't know any
different.

To install XP you would have to remove the existing system volume and create
a new one from the resulting free space. XP can read a volume created by
Vista, but it can't install to one.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

"Disturbed" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news9C5653F-1326-455B-84A4-(E-Mail Removed)...
>I purchased a computer about a year ago. Windows Vista was still vaporware
> at the time so the manufacturer installed Windows XP on the computer with
> the
> promise that I would be due a free "Express Ugrade" Disk to Windows Vista
> Business. After About 6 months I finally received my "Express Upgrade"
> Disk.
> I later bought the "Windows Anytime Upgrade" to Windows Vista Ultimate.
>
> The hard drive went bad last week. I tried to reinstall Windows on a new
> hard drive using my "Express Upgrade" disk to perform a clean install.
> Everything looked like the installation went well. I then used my
> "Windows
> Anytime Upgrade" to upgrade to Ultimate. Everything looked all right
> during
> the process. I then installed all my programs over the next two days.
> Still
> no problems arose. Last Friday I started getting message windows stating
> that
> I needed to Activate my Windows. Since my activation key is embedded in
> the
> Windows_Anytime_Upgrade.slupkg-ms XrML Digital License Package file, I
> tried to activate by phone. The technician I talked to told me that I
> first
> needed to install my Windows XP, then install my Windows Express Upgrade,
> then my Windows Anytime Upgrade. Even though I was extremely angry that I
> should have to spend two days reinstalling my Windows Vista and all my
> other
> software, I decided to give it a try. What else can I do? I gave it a try
> but Windows XP would not find my hard drive since the partitioning of
> Windows
> Vista is different than Windows XP. The hard drive still has the
> non-activated Windows Vista on it.
>
> How can I either get an activation key that will work, or at least install
> Windows Vista Ultimate with the least trouble?
>
> Stuart J. Cohen
>
>
>

On Mon, 14 Jan 2008 10:51:01 -0800, Disturbed
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>I purchased a computer about a year ago. Windows Vista was still vaporware
>at the time so the manufacturer installed Windows XP on the computer with the
>promise that I would be due a free "Express Ugrade" Disk to Windows Vista
>Business. After About 6 months I finally received my "Express Upgrade" Disk.
> I later bought the "Windows Anytime Upgrade" to Windows Vista Ultimate.
>
>The hard drive went bad last week. I tried to reinstall Windows on a new
>hard drive using my "Express Upgrade" disk to perform a clean install.
>Everything looked like the installation went well. I then used my "Windows
>Anytime Upgrade" to upgrade to Ultimate. Everything looked all right during
>the process. I then installed all my programs over the next two days. Still
>no problems arose. Last Friday I started getting message windows stating that
>I needed to Activate my Windows. Since my activation key is embedded in the
>Windows_Anytime_Upgrade.slupkg-ms XrML Digital License Package file, I
>tried to activate by phone. The technician I talked to told me that I first
>needed to install my Windows XP, then install my Windows Express Upgrade,
>then my Windows Anytime Upgrade. Even though I was extremely angry that I
>should have to spend two days reinstalling my Windows Vista and all my other
>software, I decided to give it a try. What else can I do? I gave it a try
>but Windows XP would not find my hard drive since the partitioning of Windows
>Vista is different than Windows XP. The hard drive still has the
>non-activated Windows Vista on it.

The partitioning on the disk drive shouldn't prevent Windows XP setup
from seeing the drive. What would, however, is the lack of a Windows
XP driver (AHCI) for the interface that the drive is connected to.

>
>How can I either get an activation key that will work, or at least install
>Windows Vista Ultimate with the least trouble?
>
>Stuart J. Cohen
>
>