A few questions about product activation

[Ian]

I've been tinkering with sysprep for Windows XP lately for the purpose of
cloning machines. As a result I've had to deal with product activation a
fair bit and have a few questions.

1. I've installed XP Pro many times from the setup disc and I don't think
I've ever been required to activate it. Yet if I run sysprep and give the
machine a new SID, I need to activate XP within 30 days. Why is that? I
was under the (possibly wrong) impression that Professional did not need to
be activated, yet here it is asking me to activate it after I run sysprep.

2. According to Microsoft's knowledge base, replacing the video card and
NIC would be enough of a change to force a reactivation of XP. Yet I have
done this to multiple workstations (some even got additional ram) and have
never been prompted to reactivate XP. I can only guess that it's because
they are all Professional versions of XP. If that's true, then I redirect
your attention to question #1.

3. Is it possible to "sysprep" Office XP as well? We buy all Dell
computers, so they all come with Windows XP Pro and Office XP (now they're
coming with Office 2003 so that would require a separate image). Whenever
we get a replacement machine for a designer, I wipe the old one, reinstall
everything and give it to someone else, and so on down the line. I would
love to create an image that had Office installed on it as well as Windows,
but I'm not aware of a way to reenter the registration code for Office that
came with the destination machine. Is there a way to do this?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Gary Davis]

1. XP Pro does require activation.

2. Activation will be triggered by changing more then one thing. If you
change the Video and Memory then it would probably trigger activation.

3. I do this at the business I work for. Build a machine with everything you
want I.E. Office 2003 etc. Then when your ready to make a image do the
sysprep. The image will ask for the XP key but not any software you have
installed like office 2003.

Hope this helps.

 

[kurttrail]

"By the act of scrolling this post on your computer, and/or printing or
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ever and ever! Amen!"

Ian wrote:

2. According to Microsoft's knowledge base, replacing the video card
and NIC would be enough of a change to force a reactivation of XP.
Yet I have done this to multiple workstations (some even got
additional ram) and have never been prompted to reactivate XP. I can
only guess that it's because they are all Professional versions of
XP. If that's true, then I redirect your attention to question #1.

Can you post a link to where you found that replacing VID and NIC
triggers PA?

The way it's supposed to work is that you can change 6 devices on a
computer with a NIC, or 4 devices on computers without a NIC. The
reason you're ask to activate after changing the Product Key is that it
makes it a different license.

http://aumha.org/win5/a/wpa.htm

http://www.microsoft.com/piracy/basics/activation/mpafaq.asp

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;299840

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;291997

--
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Kurt
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"Trustworthy Computing" is only another example of an Oxymoron!
"Produkt-Aktivierung macht frei!"

 

[Ian]

Sure, here's the link. It describes the point system under Technical
Activation Details -> How does MPA Determine Tolerance. Now that I've
reread it, I realized I missed something yesterday. I was assuming there
were a total of 10 points to work with. But there are 10 hardware
characteristics, with the NIC being worth 3 points, for a total of 12
points. Under a 12 point system, the NIC and video card still leave 8
unaltered points, so it would still pass. I was assuming a total of 10
points, which would have left me only 6 unaltered. I'll leave the link
anyway for those who care to read it.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;302878