Re-installing Windows XP home

[Link]

Hi guys.

I am thinking about getting a new HDD, to replace me current primary. Obviously this would entail reinstalling windows XP. My question is, how does the licensing activation deal work. Does it just let you re-acvivate after a certain amount of time (And if so, how long is that time) or do you have to phone MS to activate over the phone and if so, how difficult do MS make it?

Cheers - Link

 

[JFry]

If you are talking about registering you get 1 month before windows won't work anymore. It will prompt you to activate it and you can do it over the internet. I don't see why you would want to do it over the phone.

 

[Link]

Thanks for the reply, but thats not what I meant

The whole point of activating is that your key cannot be activated again, to prevent people from handing the key around. My question was, is there a time limit and then you can activate straight over the net again, or do you always have to phone MS to get it re-activated.

 

[[Matt]]

Thanks for the reply, but thats not what I meant

The whole point of activating is that your key cannot be activated again, to prevent people from handing the key around. My question was, is there a time limit and then you can activate straight over the net again, or do you always have to phone MS to get it re-activated.

They allow several activations within a certain time period before you need to phone up MS to get a reset.

 

[Link]

Really? Great, thanks a lot Matt, and JFry for the help.

Any idea what the actual number is btw?

 

[SidewinderX]

hmm, well, I had to re-install wuinxp home on a computer that we had had for 2 years. We couldn't configure it to work on the network (to share the internet connection) because we couldn't access those properties, so WE had to call. It wasn't much of a pain, it was jsut and autpomated thing that gave us all the info.