De-Activation and Re-Activation on the same computer

[Guest]

Hello, I put together a new machine and decided to put Vista on it; anyway
the raid drivers were a littel flaky and my drives corrupted. I had to
recreate the array.

I wasn't able to reactivate, the internet activation failed, even though
there were no changes to the machine (except the raid volume was recreated);
using the phone system worked.

To avoid this in the future (ie what if my drives fail and I have to
reinstall) how do I
"De-Activate" Vista?

 

[Saucy]

Hello, I put together a new machine and decided to put Vista on it; anyway
the raid drivers were a littel flaky and my drives corrupted. I had to
recreate the array.

I wasn't able to reactivate, the internet activation failed, even though
there were no changes to the machine (except the raid volume was
recreated);
using the phone system worked.

To avoid this in the future (ie what if my drives fail and I have to
reinstall) how do I
"De-Activate" Vista?

You don't. If online activation does not go through then use the phone
number - you probably will have to speak to a representative. Tell them you
clean re-installed on the same computer. They should approve it and give you
the numbers.

Saucy

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

Noel

There is no "de-activation".

The way activation works is that when you activate with a particular product
key, that information is kept in the activation servers at Microsoft. The
activation information is reset on the activation servers every 120 days. If
you activate again before 120 days has passed, the automatic internet
activation will fail and you will be required to use the telephone to
re-activate. If it has been more than 120 days, the automatic internet
activation will work.

 

[Guest]

Hi noel,
I have a question for you. I installed vista from a copy cd and now I now
they want me to set the activation I have 7 days to do that this copy is on
another computer in the house that was installed when bought.
The question is what if I don't activate what will happen then to the
computer it is originally on. and will vista stop working on my machine.
thanks

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

Joannie

You will not be able to activate your machine because the producty key was
used on the other machine. The computer you installed the copy on will stop
working in 7 days. This will not effect the original computer where Vista is
installed and activated.

You can purchase another license for Vista and use that license to activate
the computer where the copy is installed.

 

[Guest]

thank you for your reply what do you mean by it will stop running
completely,I ordered a xp sp2 and I did a back up of my files so if I install
xp what I had before
am I going to have a problem running my computer it won't end up crashing or
anything like that will it.
I heard if I do that vista will taken off and my xp will be ok. if wrong I
will have to buy a activation # or I can't do that either.
thanks again Ronnie

 

[Brian W]

Noel

There is no "de-activation".

The way activation works is that when you activate with a particular
product key, that information is kept in the activation servers at
Microsoft. The activation information is reset on the activation servers
every 120 days. If you activate again before 120 days has passed, the
automatic internet activation will fail and you will be required to use
the telephone to re-activate. If it has been more than 120 days, the
automatic internet activation will work.

Has anyone ever confirmed that the activation server resets after 120 days??
Thanks in advance

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

Has anyone ever confirmed that the activation server resets after 120
days??
Thanks in advance

Brian

I haven't seen any definitive study about this, but just from my own
experience this does seem to be true. We haven't seen much in the way of
documentation on changes with WPA in Vista like we had when XP was first
released and we saw the Licenturion documentation.

Windows Product Activation:
http://www.licenturion.com/xp/

No Title:
http://www.licenturion.com/xp/fully-licensed-wpa.txt

No Title:
http://www.licenturion.com/xp/fully-licensed-faq.txt