False 'Activation' message in XP Home

[Philip Andrews]

Hi,

I get a message on an old installation of XP Home that 'Windows needs to
be activated'. This follows a major crash, where the power-supply and
motherboard bundle had to be replaced because the machine wouldn't boot at
all. When I click 'OK', the machine things for a few seconds and then tells
me that Windows is already activated ... pressing 'OK' takes me back to the
log-in screen. I can get into Windows OK through Safe Mode, where the
message doesn't appear - but not through Nomal Mode. Any help or advice
would be appreciated - the installation is about 4 years old, and appears to
have run perfectly up until this disaster occurred.

Any help or suggestions would be most welcome.

Cheers,

Philip

 

[Guest]

Hi,

When major hardware change is detected, Windows would need to reactivate.

Since your reactivation is confused, try the steps provided in the article
below:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/328874/

Thanks,
Obaid.

 

[Bob Harris]

Replacing the motherboard changes enough hardware to almost guarrantee
triggering re-activation.

Further, replacing the motherboard almost always requires a "repair"
installation of XP, **before** booting into XP, to get the right hardware
drivers installed. It is almost amazing that XP functions at all, unless
the old and new motherboards were the same model.

If the PC came with XP pre-installed from a major PC vendor (e.g., Dell,
Gateway), then the copy of XP was probably BIOS-locked. If you change the
motherboard, the BIOS software changes, and thus the activation fails. The
only ways to replace a motherboard on such a PC, without buying a new
verison of XP, is to let the original PC maker do it.

If the PC was home-built, with a full-retail (or retail upgrade) version of
XP, then you can re-activate as many times as you want. So, just
re-activate. See below, if you are in an activation loop.

If the PC was home-built using an OEM version of XP (cheaper than retail by
about $100), then that verison is locked to the original hardware. There is
no provision in the license to replace the motherboard, even if it dies.
However, I have heard that if you call the 800 number that should appear on
the activation screen, then sometimes you can talk the Microsoft
representative into giving you the code to re-activate.

In your case, the activation software apears to be somewhat confused, since
it permits safe mode. If this is a retail version of XP, you could try a
"repair" installation, which should refresh the XP system files, hopefully
including the activation software. If it is OEM version of XP, a repair is
generall not possible, but check with the PC merndor to be sure. If OEM and
no repair, then there should ber some way to restore the PC to day-one, at
the cost of losing all your personal data. But, if you can get into safe
mode, then you can copy that off of the PC, before the restore.

If what you call safe mode can not copy files, then that is really not the
normal safe mode. Other options to rescue files include "live" LINUX CDs,
such as KNOPPIX. These can boot a PC, without writing to the hard drive,
and copy files out to USB drives. KNOPPIX supports the NTFS file system
often used by XP, as well as FAT32. It does not care about XP file
permissions, but I do not believe that it can handle XP-encrypted files, if
you happended to use that feature.

One other idea: Try searching these newgroups, and others, for topics like
"false activation", "reactivation loop XP", etc. Somewhere I recall reading
something that sounded a bit like your problem, in which part of XP said to
activate, but another said that you were already activated. I found this
at: http://www.pcbuyerbeware.co.uk/ProductActivation.htm

The Product Activation data is kept in the wpa.dbl file in the
C:\Windows\System32 folder. If you have access to a master image or backup
copy of that file that was created when the PC was working properly, you can
boot into Safe Mode, open Windows Explorer, and copy the wpa.dbl file into
the C:\Windows\System32 folder. Reboot and you should be back in business.
If that doesn't work, boot into Safe Mode again and delete the wpa.dbl and
wpa.bak files, and reboot. With those files no longer there, Windows XP will
have to reactivate, because it reads them when it checks to see if it is
activated.

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Hi,

I get a message on an old installation of XP Home that 'Windows needs to
be activated'. This follows a major crash, where the power-supply and
motherboard bundle had to be replaced because the machine wouldn't boot at
all.

Normally, and assuming a retail license (many factory-installed OEM
installations are BIOS-locked to a specific chipset and therefore are
*not* transferable to a new motherboard - check yours before starting),
unless the new motherboard is virtually identical (same chipset, same
IDE controllers, same BIOS version, etc.) to the one on which the WinXP
installation was originally performed, you'll need to perform a repair
(a.k.a. in-place upgrade) installation, at the very least:

How to Perform an In-Place Upgrade of Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/directory/article.asp?ID=KB;EN-US;Q315341

Changing a Motherboard or Moving a Hard Drive with WinXP Installed
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/moving_xp.html

The "why" is quite simple, really, and has nothing to do with
licensing issues, per se; it's a purely technical matter, at this point.
You've pulled the proverbial hardware rug out from under the OS. (If
you don't like -- or get -- the rug analogy, think of it as picking up a
Cape Cod style home and then setting it down onto a Ranch style
foundation. It just isn't going to fit.) WinXP, like Win2K before it,
is not nearly as "promiscuous" as Win9x when it comes to accepting any
old hardware configuration you throw at it. On installation it
"tailors" itself to the specific hardware found. This is one of the
reasons that the entire WinNT/2K/XP OS family is so much more stable
than the Win9x group.

As always when undertaking such a significant change, back up any
important data before starting.

This will also probably require re-activation, unless you have a
Volume Licensed version of WinXP Pro installed. If it's been more than
120 days since you last activated that specific Product Key, you'll most
likely be able to activate via the Internet without problem. If it's
been less, you might have to make a 5 minute phone call.

When I click 'OK', the machine things for a few seconds and then tells
me that Windows is already activated ... pressing 'OK' takes me back to the
log-in screen. I can get into Windows OK through Safe Mode, where the
message doesn't appear - but not through Nomal Mode. Any help or advice
would be appreciated - the installation is about 4 years old, and appears to
have run perfectly up until this disaster occurred.

--

Bruce Chambers

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