Windows says it cannot check license

[Beemer Biker]

"A problem is preventing Windows from accurately checking the license for
this computer. Error Code: 8007007F"

I googled this message and read up on the possible solutions...

I dont have the keys
HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Cryptography\Providers
....or...
HKEY_USERS\S-1-5-20\Software\Microsoft\Cryptography\Provider

so there are none to delete. In addition, I have the files oembios.dat and
secupd.dat. They are not missing from system32 which was also listed as a
cause of this problem.


I did find that the "D" drive was being used for the reinstall of XP home.
It was not supposed to have "windows" and I pulled out the "D" drive when I
discovered this (after about 3 re-installs). There is an article here
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=310794 that mentions replaceing D with C
or viceversa on some dell or gateway computers.
====history====
I replaced a defective socket 370 intel MB with a new A7N8X MB and AMD chip
that had an original XP Home "SP0" on the hard drive. At the time the board
went out (capacitors blew) it had the latest SP2 plus McAfee 7.1 and was a
working system. I booted the OEM cd and when told there was an existing
windows, I selected repair. This should have worked and I have done it in
the past and even made my own slipstreamed OEM+SP2. The installed seemed
to go just fine but when I rebooted I got that error message and was unable
to log into windows. I repeated the install a couple of times eventually
useing "replace windows" instead of "repair windows". Nothing different..
I booted up in safe mode and noticed that the "D" drive had a copy of
windows. Somehow the install put it onto the D drive instead of the C. The
root drive was always C and I was never asked which drive to put it on. All
drive references showed the letter "C".

I pulled out the "D" drive and repeated the "repair" install with the oem
cd. It failed with the same problem. I booted into the safe mode and
verified that the new nvidia & asus chipset drivers had indeed been loaded
and there were no yellow bangs in "system". The START-PROGRAM shows that
all my son's stuff is still there, this system should boot up and run but I
cant get past that license check failure.

This microsoft article talks about what happends when the "D" is used
instead of the "C"
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/223188
I have drives listed from DosDevice\A thru DosDevice\J or maybe higher as
there is an 8-in-one flash memory adapter, two cdroms and (now) only one
hard drive. It would appear that "devices mounted" key listes all devices
even though I pulled the USB cable from the internal flash.

Does anyone know what is going on? None of these are dells or gateways
which are mentioned as haveing similar problems.
I can post the contents of the registery at that "devices mounted" key if it
is useful. Has anyone got any suggestions?

...thanks for reading this post..

 

[Beemer Biker]

"A problem is preventing Windows from accurately checking the license for
this computer. Error Code: 8007007F"

Solved: I compared my registery at MountedDevices with another similar
computer and I had 2x as many GUID's. At the key: "DosDevice\C:" there was
a guid. That guid was unique on the other computer. On my computer, just
above the DosDevice lists, there were two entries for that guid. I deleted
*ALL* keys under "MountedDevices" and re-installed that second "repair" from
the XP OEM and the system booted up just fine. It was not necessary to
reformat or delete the partition or do a clean install and all the files,
desktops, startups, etc were left intact. I did have to reactivate but that
was because of the massive changout of the motherboard.

Hope this helps somebody else.

 

[Beemer Biker]

X-NETCOP-DISCLAIMER: Top-posted as this is my own followup which I am doing
to document an easier way to fix the problem.

This happened a 2nd time on another system and I got a handle on how it
happens. I had to repair a system and the owner had a defective blue dell
XP-SP1A. I tried a repair with a green colored dell XP-SP2 and it would not
accept the activation serial number. I then went back to that blue one,
cleaned it in warm soapy water and managed to get it to boot but into that
"a problem is preventing windows from accurately checking the license" mode.
A boot into safe mode showed a total of 3 identical entries for the "C"
drive at that MountedDevices registery key. I deleted all entries except
that default key at the top and rebooted. I was able to register. It was
not necessary to do another repair like the other system. I think I booted
directly into the repair disk on the other system and didnt try a plain
reboot after getting rid of the MountedDevices entries.