consultant said:
I have just run a OS repair on a laptop that had a lot of problems.
Not having the product key available, i ran Magical Jellybean to get it -
all is well, so far.
I throw in a XP Pro CD to the computer (this was previously XPH, but
upgraded a while ago) and the repair seemed to go well, until it was time to
enter the product key. Long and short, the key is not being taken!
Any one with suggestions on how to save this repair?
Two major mistakes:
1. On OEM machines, running a key finder such as Magical Jellybean will
show the Product Key used by the OEM to build their image. This is not
the correct Product Key for end user reinstallation. The correct Product
Key is on a sticker on the bottom of the laptop, on the side of a
desktop. If the Product Key has been removed, then:
a. Contact the OEM for recovery disks. This is usually the best and
least expensive solution if recovery disks are available.
b. If the above is impossible, the end user needs to purchase a retail
copy of XP and use the key from that. Depending on whether the laptop
has XP Home or Pro, a clean install may be necessary.
2. Normally in cases where reinstallation/repair is required on an OEM
machine and the client has no original installation media, a generic OEM
install disk is used. *However*, it must be used with the Product Key
that is on the sticker on the laptop/desktop. Again, if that Product Key
is not available you can't use this option.
Hope that made things clearer. Now to get the machine working again,
you'd be best off backing up the data from outside the operating system
and do a clean install with installation media as described in #1 above.
Malke
