psomerson said:
1. What does "Windows Validation" (
http://snipurl.com/b55x ) exactly
do? Does it just check whether your product key is not blacklisted? Is
the hardware unique id involved in any way, as with product
activation?
From what I understand about it so far, MS takes unencrypted info about
you computer, not the hardware hash from Activation.
And with Activation, the hardware hash is a NONUNIQUE value that cannot
be backwards calculated.
"The hardware hash value is a nonunique representation of the PC on
which the software was installed. It is called a hash value because it
has no direct correlation to the PC and cannot be backward-calculated to
the original value." -
http://www.microsoft.com/piracy/activation_faq.mspx
Validation Info from
http://www.microsoft.com/genuine/downloads/FAQ.aspx?displaylang=en :
Q.What information is collected from my machine?
A.The genuine validation process will collect information about your
system, such as Windows product key, PC manufacturer, and operating
system version, to determine if Windows is genuine. This process does
not collect or send any information that can be used to identify you or
contact you. The complete list of information collected in the
validation process is shown below:
OEM product key
PC Manufacturer
OS version
PID/SID
BIOS info (make, version, date)
BIOS MD5 Checksum
Q.What information will Microsoft request from me as part of the genuine
validation process?
A.Microsoft may ask you to input some or all of the following
information during the genuine validation process:
Home, small business or enterprise user
Brand of PC
City where PC was purchased
Country/Region where PC was purchased
Place of PC purchase
Microsoft does not collect any information during this process that can
be used to identify you or contact you.
Q.How does Microsoft use this information?
A.The information is used for three purposes: Web page flow,
demographics, and to confirm user input. Web page flow means tailoring
pages presented based on the user's responses. Demographic information
helps Microsoft to understand regional differences in Windows usage, and
helps us tailor responses appropriately. User input is often compared
against data collected from the PC in order to determine whether to
grant a user's request for additional access.
So Validation is different than Activation because it does not take a
non-unique hardware snapshot like Activation, but takes certain
unencryted info about your computer.
2. My XP system didn't pass "Windows Validation". Suppose I buy a
genuine Windows XP license, how do I use it to successfully validate
my PC? There is a utility that changes the product key on various
Microsoft products including XP. Is it safe/legal to use?
Mandatory Validation doesn't start until some time after mid-year in all
but 3 countries, and for a while after that, and MS has yet to specify
for how long, you can get updates without having to validate by turning
on Automatic Update. My guess is that the Auto Update grace period will
be around the 6 months time frame after MS introduces mandatory
Validation.
But unless MS puts their downloads onto a secure server, which would
slow down access to the patches, you will be able to download the
updated directly off of their server. Right now, MS has Photo Story 3
as a "reward" for users that have passed voluntary Validation, but if
can be directly downloaded right off of MS's server with out going
through the validation process.
http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/9/4/494AB2A4-1427-4ABC-9E75-472F7F2C146B/Pstory.msi
And as long as MS doesn't move their downloads to a secure server, there
will be people that will publish the direct download information to the
web, like I have just done for Photo Story 3.
And as for changing over to a licensed copy of XP, doing a repair
install is your best bet. The product key you purchase more than likely
won't work with the installed copy you are using now, so the non-install
ways of changing it probably will bomb out.
How to do a repair install:
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm
--
Peace!
Kurt
Self-anointed Moderator
microscum.pubic.windowsexp.gonorrhea
http://microscum.com
"Trustworthy Computing" is only another example of an Oxymoron!
"Produkt-Aktivierung macht frei"
