Change XP license

[Lear Cabrini]

Hello to everyone,
We have installed XP Professional on a PC with one of ours MSDN license
because we were still waiting for the license acquired for that PC.
We are in 60 days so we have not yet activevated the license

Now we need to "change" licence (product key) on an already installed system
without re-install all from the begin.
How we can to that?

And more, we should activate the license without having a network
connection. Is there a way to do that too?

Thank you,

Lear Cabrini

 

[TaurArian]

1. You could visit:
http://www.microsoft.com/genuine/selfhelp/pkuinstructions.aspx

2. Activate by telephone perhaps.
--

TaurArian [MVP] 2005-2008 - Update Services
http://taurarian.mvps.org
======================================
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/555375
Computer Maintenance: Acronis / Diskeeper / Paragon / Raxco


| Hello to everyone,
| We have installed XP Professional on a PC with one of ours MSDN license
| because we were still waiting for the license acquired for that PC.
| We are in 60 days so we have not yet activevated the license
|
| Now we need to "change" licence (product key) on an already installed system
| without re-install all from the begin.
| How we can to that?
|
| And more, we should activate the license without having a network
| connection. Is there a way to do that too?
|
| Thank you,
|
| Lear Cabrini
|

 

[smlunatick]

Hello to everyone,
We have installed XP Professional on a PC with one of ours MSDN license
because we were still waiting for the license acquired for that PC.
We are in 60 days so we have not yet activevated the license

Now we need to "change" licence (product key) on an already installed system
without re-install all from the begin.
How we can to that?

And more, we should activate the license without having a network
connection. Is there a way to do that too?

Thank you,

Lear Cabrini

You must know that the different levels of XP (Retail, OEM, Volume
License - VLK ) each of their own CD Key. You can not mix / match the
CD keys with different CD versions. To chnage licenses, you can do it
with software is you change the key with a same key (OEM with OEM,
Retail with Retail, VLK with VLK) If you change from OEM to Retail,
you need to do a repair re-install on top of the installed version.

 

[Jon]

Presumably there also different keys for Home and Professional?


You must know that the different levels of XP (Retail, OEM, Volume
License - VLK ) each of their own CD Key. You can not mix / match the
CD keys with different CD versions. To chnage licenses, you can do it
with software is you change the key with a same key (OEM with OEM,
Retail with Retail, VLK with VLK) If you change from OEM to Retail,
you need to do a repair re-install on top of the installed version.

 

[Lear Cabrini]

Thank you, I will follow the link.

Lear

 

[smlunatick]

Presumably there also different keys for Home and Professional?

You must know that the different levels of XP (Retail, OEM, Volume
License - VLK ) each of their own CD Key.  You can not mix / match the
CD keys with different CD versions.  To chnage licenses, you can do it
with software is you change the key with a same key (OEM with OEM,
Retail with Retail, VLK with VLK)  If you change from OEM to Retail,
you need to do a repair re-install on top of the installed version.

Actually upto three types (In North America.)

OEM: Home, Pro, Media Center Edition

Retail: Home and Pro

VLK: Pro (I believe that this is the "only" one available for Volume
Licensing. Never sold any directly.)

There is talk about another version of XP known / nick-named XP Lite.
It is a version that has the Windows Media Palyer (WMP) and Internet
Explorer "stripped" complete out, (because of judicial verdicts
against Microsoft.

 

[Jon]

Hi,

Thanks for your help on this. So if we ignore the "Lite" edition, am I right in saying that six
different XP editions that have their own Product key:

OEM Home, OEM Pro, OEM MCE, Retail Home, Retail Pro, VLK Pro.

In other words, if I need to re-install XP, I would need six different disks to cover all
possibilties.

By the way, I'm one of those unlucky people who "knows about computers" and am expected to fix
friends', relatives' and neighbours' PCs without charge. I expect that I'm not the only unlucky
person on this forum in this respect. OK, I admit it, I do get the odd bottle of wine in return.

Jon




Actually upto three types (In North America.)

OEM: Home, Pro, Media Center Edition

Retail: Home and Pro

VLK: Pro (I believe that this is the "only" one available for Volume
Licensing. Never sold any directly.)

There is talk about another version of XP known / nick-named XP Lite.
It is a version that has the Windows Media Palyer (WMP) and Internet
Explorer "stripped" complete out, (because of judicial verdicts
against Microsoft.

 

[Shenan Stanley]

Thanks for your help on this. So if we ignore the "Lite" edition,
am I right in saying that six different XP editions that have their
own Product key:

OEM Home, OEM Pro, OEM MCE, Retail Home, Retail Pro, VLK Pro.

In other words, if I need to re-install XP, I would need six
different disks to cover all possibilties.

By the way, I'm one of those unlucky people who "knows about
computers" and am expected to fix friends', relatives' and
neighbours' PCs without charge. I expect that I'm not the only
unlucky person on this forum in this respect. OK, I admit it, I do
get the odd bottle of wine in return.

If you are 'one of those unlucky people who "knows about computers"', then
you should learn to utilize this:

Search using Google!
http://www.google.com/
( How-to: http://www.google.com/intl/en/help/basics.html )

Did you know that you can 'change' a Windows XP CD so it accepts different
types of keys?
http://www.thetechguide.com/howto/setuppini.html

So you need Home, Professional, MCE, Tablet PC, x64... Doubtful you'd ever
need the last two (possible - but they better have the media.) If any of
your friends/etc ever comes to you with a volume license - it's unlikely
they need *your* help or they got screwed and need to buy a legitimate copy
anyway. As for Media Center Edition - that's OEM only.

If you *wanted* to _prepare_, you'd have those three and be able to change
the dirst two as needed to retail/oem - however - even as 'one of those
unlucky people who "knows about computers"', I make people supply their own
media and *teach* them that they should always get a copy of the actual
installation media at time of purchase *and* make a backup of it and the
product key and put them in a safe place. Saves me time.

 

[smlunatick]

Hi,

Thanks for your help on this. So if we ignore the "Lite" edition, am I right in saying that six
different XP editions that have their own Product key:

OEM Home, OEM Pro, OEM MCE, Retail Home, Retail Pro, VLK Pro.

In other words, if I need to re-install XP, I would need six different disks to cover all
possibilties.

By the way, I'm one of those unlucky people who "knows about computers" and am expected to fix
friends', relatives' and neighbours' PCs without charge. I expect that I'mnot the only unlucky
person on this forum in this respect. OK, I admit it, I do get the odd bottle of wine in return.

Jon



Actually upto three types (In North America.)

OEM:  Home, Pro, Media Center Edition

Retail: Home and Pro

VLK: Pro (I believe that this is the "only" one available for Volume
Licensing.  Never sold any directly.)

There is talk about another version of XP known / nick-named XP Lite.
It is a version that has the Windows Media Palyer (WMP) and Internet
Explorer "stripped" complete out, (because of judicial verdicts
against Microsoft.

No! Volume Licensing is to be used for large "company" PC deployment,
which the company usually have a dedicated IT support staff.

OEM Media Centre Edition is deployed on a limitied PC configurations
and usually is delivered pre-installed on PC (Dell, HPs etc..) Local
PC "assemblers" would not normally make MCE PCs because of the
"extremely" limited list os compatible hardware. MCE have a smaller
list of supported hardware than the general XP hardware list.

OEM Home / Pro and there Retail versions are not interchangable. 4
copies needed, if you only want with Service Pack 2 (SP2.) Otherwise
12 copies would be needed for every service pack level (Original
Release, SP1 and SP2.) But this is "over-kill."

 

[Jon]

Thanks Shenan (and smlunatick) - more good information.

Thanks for your help on this. So if we ignore the "Lite" edition,
am I right in saying that six different XP editions that have their
own Product key:

OEM Home, OEM Pro, OEM MCE, Retail Home, Retail Pro, VLK Pro.

In other words, if I need to re-install XP, I would need six
different disks to cover all possibilties.

By the way, I'm one of those unlucky people who "knows about
computers" and am expected to fix friends', relatives' and
neighbours' PCs without charge. I expect that I'm not the only
unlucky person on this forum in this respect. OK, I admit it, I do
get the odd bottle of wine in return.

If you are 'one of those unlucky people who "knows about computers"', then
you should learn to utilize this:

Search using Google!
http://www.google.com/
( How-to: http://www.google.com/intl/en/help/basics.html )

Did you know that you can 'change' a Windows XP CD so it accepts different
types of keys?
http://www.thetechguide.com/howto/setuppini.html

So you need Home, Professional, MCE, Tablet PC, x64... Doubtful you'd ever
need the last two (possible - but they better have the media.) If any of
your friends/etc ever comes to you with a volume license - it's unlikely
they need *your* help or they got screwed and need to buy a legitimate copy
anyway. As for Media Center Edition - that's OEM only.

If you *wanted* to _prepare_, you'd have those three and be able to change
the dirst two as needed to retail/oem - however - even as 'one of those
unlucky people who "knows about computers"', I make people supply their own
media and *teach* them that they should always get a copy of the actual
installation media at time of purchase *and* make a backup of it and the
product key and put them in a safe place. Saves me time.