Trouble activating OEM XP

[Guest]

Our senario is; we have about 500 machines in various computer labs the vast
majority of these 400+ were purchased with XP preinstalled by the OEM. As we
aquired these machines we would reformat them and put windows 2000 on them.
We would now like to *upgrade* them to windows xp. But for some reason
reinstalling with the OEM cd fails during activation.

I was able to get the machine activated after a 10 minute phone call to
microsoft, but the idea is to avoid doing that 500 times.

So is there something I should be doing to get activation to work with the
product key.

Thanks

 

[Star Fleet Admiral Q]

Nope - since April MS has discontinued OEM "internet" activation in a effort
to "cut-down" on the casual pirating of OEM OS software, as the sticker it
clearly attached in plain view on the machine. Only the OEM's which supply
a BIOS locked version can be readily installed with pre-activation.
In other words, if you reload with the Original OEM OS, you'll need to make
that 10 minute call for each one, each and every time it needs to be
reactivated.
Note: Most companies, schools, etc, with 500 or so machines would have
bought the machines with "NO" OS and purchase Volume Licensing from MS or a
certified MS representative - with Volume Licensing, there is no Activation
process.

--

Star Fleet Admiral Q @ your Service!

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