jaytc2003

iTrader: (1)

Guy at work has brought his pc in, it is a hp pavillion ### and it has windows xp home on with sp2. It has got the geniune windows stickers on the case so I do believe it has a genuine version in there.
The problem is, the computer was working fine, then someone upgraded the computer by adding a wireless card to it as they upgraded the modem router to a wireless version. When they installed the wireless card, they removed the ethernet card. They re booted and installed the drivers etc and everything was fine. However, it must have messed the activation up (I always believed this should only happen if you make major changes to hardware) as now after x amount of days of it working (I imagine 30) it will no longer let them log on as you get a pop up box saying "this version of windows needs to be activated, would you like to activate now?" If you select yes, it just sort of logs out back to the welcome screen (even though you havent gone past this anyway)

Is there anyway around this, the guy doesnt have the image disc that came with the pc (it is an xp1800 processor so is a good few years old)

TopBanana

Call the UK activation cntr: 0800 018 8354

jaytc2003

iTrader: (1)

Cheers for that number may come in useful, just gonna try safe mode when I can get away from my desk, as I have been to a microsoft support page and got info on how to deactivate it, then I can run the activate by phone wizard.

jaytc2003

iTrader: (1)

anyone any ideas, rang the above number they cant do anything, rang microsoft tech support on 0870 6010100 they cant/wont help because its a HP computer so I rang HP and get told to go to the web!

WOuldnt mind if it was a dodgy copy, but it is definately legit and the owner of the computer only just knows how to use them so he wasnt aware of any messages or anything etc!

TopBanana

Can you go into safe mode and do a system restore? If that doesn't fix it you'll need to do a Repair Install:
Don't press R for Recovery Console, press Enter. Choose the existing partition and press R. All the programs that were previously installed should still be there, but you will need to reapply service packs.

jaytc2003

iTrader: (1)

system restore fails in safe mode. Wont I need the disk for a repair install? As he cannot find the imge disk that he had with the pc (didnt get the xp disc with the computer, only an image disc)

TopBanana

Yes you will need the disc. Any XP home disc will do

jaytc2003

iTrader: (1)

Spoke with microsoft technical again, registered a few dll's and deleted a key in the registry, we then got further (product activation) but it didnt bring the full box up so they suggested a restore. Will take the box home later and use my genuine copy of home to run a repair. Did suggest this to microsoft tech guy but he said it probably wouldnt work! (may try doing a fresh install using my disc but his reg code but that prob wont work)

TopBanana

I'd say it probably will work

jaytc2003

iTrader: (1)

cheers TopBanana.
Funnily, totally off topic, we have an IT person at work (programmer) and we call her Top Banana

jaytc2003

iTrader: (1)

hmmm tried the repair option, didnt work, could not locate a file and funnily enough it wouldnt let me access the cd drive!

So restarted, used the recovery console and the bootcfg command to see what was going on, and there were 3 versions of xp home installed!!

Deleted 2 of them, used the bootcfg /rebuild cmd and then did a fixmbr and rebooted and it is now fine! Turns out that the lad whose pc it is got it off his dad, and his brother had installed limewire and had gotten a load of viruses, so his dad put another copy of xp home on it. Looks like everything got screwed up and windows didnt know where to look etc.