pirate copy overwriten with legit copy

[Guest]

i have had a customer that brought there computer to me and i have discovered
that they had a illegal copy of xp pro installed i know this because sp2 wont
allow access past the log on screen they were informed and were quite
suprised,i informed them that they needed to purchase a legit copy now they
have done so but my problem is this i cant get the legit copy in the pc
without erasing important files they need can anyone help ?

 

[Guest]

i have had a customer that brought there computer to me and i have discovered
that they had a illegal copy of xp pro installed i know this because sp2 wont
allow access past the log on screen they were informed and were quite
suprised,i informed them that they needed to purchase a legit copy now they
have done so but my problem is this i cant get the legit copy in the pc
without erasing important files they need can anyone help ?

 

[Guest]

best bet is to sell them a new hard drive. Install the legit version of xp,
then copy the important files from the old hard drive to the new one. Then
reformat the old one once all the data has been transfered. With hard drives
being so cheap it is probably your lowest cost option versus your labour
cost. Besides they probably are in need of extra storage anyway.

 

[Mr Smith]

if it's just files then you could put the drive in another PC as a
slave and copy them off before doing the install

 

[Jupiter Jones [MVP]]

I do not fully understand how you determined it was pirated.
But this can help:
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar/invalpk.htm

A Repair Installation using a legitimate Windows XP Pro will normally
preserve data:
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar/repaxp.htm