XP Home activation problem

[Guest]

My computer was subject to a significant power spike which fried my
motherboard and damaged my hard disk. When I replaced the board, XP would no
longer boot and I found the disk to have unrecoverable errors. I replaced
the hard drive as well and then reinstalled XP from my original, legitimate
CD and attempted to activate. The activation however failed. I tried both
Internet and phone activation with no luck. Good news is, I have my computer
back, bad news is I have 30 days before Windows will expire. I have the
certificate of authenticity, CD key, manual, everything - it just won't let
me activate it as I believe it has identified the new board & hard drive as a
new machine.

Any help would be appreciated.

thanks,
Derek

 

[Carey Frisch [MVP]]

If you have an OEM version of Windows XP, then that
license is tied to the original hardware configuration
and cannot be transferred to a new hardware configuration.
If you indeed have an OEM version of Windows XP,
the only thing you can do is purchased a new "Full Version"
of Windows XP and perform a "Repair Install" using
the new Windows XP CD and Product Key.

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

How to Perform a Windows XP Repair Install
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

[Courtesy of MS-MVP Michael Stevens]

Windows Product Activation (WPA) on Windows XP
http://aumha.org/win5/a/wpa.htm

[Courtesy of MS-MVP Alex Nichol]

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User

Be Smart! Protect Your PC!
http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/protect/default.aspx

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:

| My computer was subject to a significant power spike which fried my
| motherboard and damaged my hard disk. When I replaced the board, XP would no
| longer boot and I found the disk to have unrecoverable errors. I replaced
| the hard drive as well and then reinstalled XP from my original, legitimate
| CD and attempted to activate. The activation however failed. I tried both
| Internet and phone activation with no luck. Good news is, I have my computer
| back, bad news is I have 30 days before Windows will expire. I have the
| certificate of authenticity, CD key, manual, everything - it just won't let
| me activate it as I believe it has identified the new board & hard drive as a
| new machine.
|
| Any help would be appreciated.
|
| thanks,
| Derek

 

[D.Currie]

My computer was subject to a significant power spike which fried my
motherboard and damaged my hard disk. When I replaced the board, XP would
no
longer boot and I found the disk to have unrecoverable errors. I replaced
the hard drive as well and then reinstalled XP from my original,
legitimate
CD and attempted to activate. The activation however failed. I tried
both
Internet and phone activation with no luck. Good news is, I have my
computer
back, bad news is I have 30 days before Windows will expire. I have the
certificate of authenticity, CD key, manual, everything - it just won't
let
me activate it as I believe it has identified the new board & hard drive
as a
new machine.

Any help would be appreciated.

thanks,
Derek

When it refuses to activate on the internet, choose to activate by phone.
When that fails, you get an option to talk to a person. You need to hang on
the line long enough to get to that point, maybe press some keys to choose
options, then just answer the questions. I've had a variety of questions
asked, but mostly it's whether this is the first install, whether it's on
another computer at the same time, and what triggered the activation. As
long as you're following the rules, you'll get reactivated.