Too many installs?

[jadinolf]

Last night after giving up on a problem I was having, I wiped the drive and reinstalled XP.

I was surprised to get a notice that I had exceeded my allotment of installs and got shuttled of to what I supposed was India for a bunch of numbers to type in so that I could proceed and activate XP.

I really could not understand the young lady's English but I gathered that she said that I will have to go through this process from now on.

This was XP Home Retail.

Just curious to know how many installs I was allowed before this occurred?

Thanks.

 

[Schadenfroh]

Originally posted by: jadinolf

Not enough posts.

 

[jadinolf]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh

Originally posted by: jadinolf

Not enough posts.

They are there now.

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: jadinolf
Last night after giving up on a problem I was having, I wiped the drive and reinstalled XP.

I was surprised to get a notice that I had exceeded my allotment of installs and got shuttled of to what I supposed was India for a bunch of numbers to type in so that I could proceed and activate XP.

I really could not understand the young lady's English but I gathered that she said that I will have to go through this process from now on.

This was XP Home Retail.

Just curious to know how many installs I was allowed before this occurred?

Thanks.

You don't install again for 120 days it should reset, just appears to them the same copy is being put on multiple boxes. Once that 'settles' they reset the status.

 

[jadinolf]

Originally posted by: bsobel

Originally posted by: jadinolf
Last night after giving up on a problem I was having, I wiped the drive and reinstalled XP.

I was surprised to get a notice that I had exceeded my allotment of installs and got shuttled of to what I supposed was India for a bunch of numbers to type in so that I could proceed and activate XP.

I really could not understand the young lady's English but I gathered that she said that I will have to go through this process from now on.

This was XP Home Retail.

Just curious to know how many installs I was allowed before this occurred?

Thanks.

You don't install again for 120 days it should reset, just appears to them the same copy is being put on multiple boxes. Once that 'settles' they reset the status.

Well, thanks. That's good news. I appreciate the reply.

 

[elfnumber1]

You don't install again for 120 days it should reset, just appears to them the same copy is being put on multiple boxes. Once that 'settles' they reset the status.

I have a similar question: can you check to see if you can activate your copy anywhere?
(rephrased: is there a place that you can check to see if you've installed to the max amount of times you can?) Not exactly sure how to word this.

I don't want to go through the entire process of installation only to find out that my copy cannot be activated. It takes quite a bit of time and I also have several copies so I'd like to minimize my collection of CDs sitting in the closet. Please let me know, thanks.

 

[nweaver]

activation takes a lot of time???

Last time I had problems, and phoned in, it took like 3-5 minutes.

 

[elfnumber1]

sorry, i meant i don't want to go through the installation process only to find that i have exasperated all my uses in a windows cd. i believe the limit was 2 machines? i can't remember now, but these were all purchased legally from university campus stores.

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: elfnumber1
sorry, i meant i don't want to go through the installation process only to find that i have exasperated all my uses in a windows cd. i believe the limit was 2 machines? i can't remember now, but these were all purchased legally from university campus stores.

There is no 'multiple machine' license you acquired from your university. For each license (non OEM) XP can be installed on one system at a time (no multiple systems). As such there is no place to check if you 'exasperated all my uses in a windows cd'

Bill

 

[elfnumber1]

To clarify:

Does this mean that once I have installed and attempt to reinstall, the CD is now useless?

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: elfnumber1
To clarify:

Does this mean that once I have installed and attempt to reinstall, the CD is now useless?

No, the cd would be used to reinstall later (either on the same or a new machine). You just can't run around installing more copies than you have licenses for.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

Originally posted by: elfnumber1
To clarify:

Does this mean that once I have installed and attempt to reinstall, the CD is now useless?

No. You can continue to re-install Windows on one machine at a time for the lifetime of the product. In the case that you have an OEM copy, then your copy is permanently tied to the motherboard of that particular system. Retail copies can be installed on different machines, but only 1 at a time. To install on a new machine you must uninstall from the old machine.

 

[Seekermeister]

Is the OEM actually tied to the motherboard, or to the chipset on it?

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: Seekermeister
Is the OEM actually tied to the motherboard, or to the chipset on it?

The OEM license is tied to 'the motherboard' (thats from MS's licensing material). The chipset issue really just comes into play if you need to move an install (existing) from one board to another.

It used to be tied to 'a piece of hardware' so you'd see people selling XP Oem with a usb cable and (in theory) as long as that usb cable was on a machine, that machine was the OEM machine. MS cleared up their language and said you can upgrade all the components but when you change the motherboard out, its a new machines (sans special cases like a failed motherboard that is being replaced)

Bill

 

[elfnumber1]

Wow, ok this might be overdoing it with the questions, but I have another.

Let's say I've had several machines (motherboards) in the past. I couldn't remember what machines (whether I still own them or not) were used to install with the specific keys. Is there anyway to find that out? Basically what I'm trying to do is just toss the CDs that are useless to me and keep the ones that aren't.

All the CDs are OEM so therefore can only be installed to one machine for its life.

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: elfnumber1
Wow, ok this might be overdoing it with the questions, but I have another.

Let's say I've had several machines (motherboards) in the past. I couldn't remember what machines (whether I still own them or not) were used to install with the specific keys. Is there anyway to find that out? Basically what I'm trying to do is just toss the CDs that are useless to me and keep the ones that aren't.

All the CDs are OEM so therefore can only be installed to one machine for its life.

The cds are probably duplicates, in theory you should have a sticker on each machine which lists the license. The bits on the cd themselves don't matter. You could keep any one of the disks and then use the license key from the sticker (thats why MS suggests you attach the sticker to the machine)

 

[RebateMonger]

There are five basic types of XP Install CDs:

1) Generic OEM (Full install only...no upgrades.)
2) "Brand-Name" OEM (Full install only....only on original Brand-name PC.)
3) Retail Full (Both full install and upgrades allowed.)
4) Retail Upgrade (Both full install and upgrades allowed. You must have a previous-version license that stays with the PC, on top of the NEW Upgrade license.)
5) Volume License (Corporate and educational versions.) (EULA says that these are ONLY for upgrades of existing OS licenses. You aren't supposed to install a VLK version on a NEW PC).

With a few exceptions, only the Retail and the Volume License OSes can be moved to a different motherboard. NONE of the licenses allow a single OS license to be shared among multiple computers.

Within each type of CD, all the bits are identical (as bsobel states). Individual "serial numbers" are not assigned to each of the zillion CDs that Microsoft makes. Hopefully, they never will be. :thumbsdown:

Originally posted by: elfnumber1
Basically what I'm trying to do is just toss the CDs that are useless to me and keep the ones that aren't.

I think the very LAST thing I'd ever throw out is a functional XP Install CD. Heck, they don't take up THAT much room. I advise everyone to make COPIES of their XP Install CDs and store them somewhere safe.

 

[Doom Machine]

it helps to make a full image of the activated copy, that way it only takes a couple minutes to reinstall everything and its already activated
acronis trueimage is good, so is ghost

 

[jadinolf]

Interesting thread.

I'm glad I started it.

 

[pcgeek11]

Originally posted by: Doom Machine
it helps to make a full image of the activated copy, that way it only takes a couple minutes to reinstall everything and its already activated
acronis trueimage is good, so is ghost

I make a good " Base " install... then Trueimage it once for each machine and never have to install or activate again. Except for very unusual situations.

pcgeek11

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: pcgeek11

Originally posted by: Doom Machine
it helps to make a full image of the activated copy, that way it only takes a couple minutes to reinstall everything and its already activated
acronis trueimage is good, so is ghost

I make a good " Base " install... then Trueimage it once for each machine and never have to install or activate again. Except for very unusual situations.

pcgeek11

I admit this isnt overly relevant in an XP thread, but I thought I should point out that Vista includes a native disk image backup program that you can use to later recover from the Vista boot disk.

It's not as full featured as Acronis, Ghost, or other similar tools but for many users it could be a good option.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
There are five basic types of XP Install CDs:

1) Generic OEM (Full install only...no upgrades.)
2) "Brand-Name" OEM (Full install only....only on original Brand-name PC.)
3) Retail Full (Both full install and upgrades allowed.)
4) Retail Upgrade (Both full install and upgrades allowed. You must have a previous-version license that stays with the PC, on top of the NEW Upgrade license.)
5) Volume License (Corporate and educational versions.) (EULA says that these are ONLY for upgrades of existing OS licenses. You aren't supposed to install a VLK version on a NEW PC).

With a few exceptions, only the Retail and the Volume License OSes can be moved to a different motherboard. NONE of the licenses allow a single OS license to be shared among multiple computers.

Within each type of CD, all the bits are identical (as bsobel states). Individual "serial numbers" are not assigned to each of the zillion CDs that Microsoft makes. Hopefully, they never will be. :thumbsdown:

Actually, this is not true. There are slightly different "bits" in the setup info file that correspond to the types of keys that will be used on that copy. So if you have a retail key, it may not work with an OEM CD, and vice-versa.

But you are correct that each CD is not individually serialized.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: bsobel
I admit this isnt overly relevant in an XP thread, but I thought I should point out that Vista includes a native disk image backup program that you can use to later recover from the Vista boot disk.

It's not as full featured as Acronis, Ghost, or other similar tools but for many users it could be a good option.

Wow, Vista actually includes a *good* feature. Who would have thought?

(But seriously, that's a step up from prior versions of MS Backup, and it is a good thing. Thanks for the info.)

 

[insomnio]

The only downside is that Vista doesnt use any compression