Cannot activate Vista: dual booting with XP

[gba]

Once I installed XP Pro on a second partition and successfully set up to dual boot, I went into Acer's lovely little (not) Vista install and spend over an hour removing bloatware. Upon rebooting into Vista I got prompted to activate Vista, which I was unable to do either online or over the phone. I was told by MS CS to contact Acer support, which I did. I am now waiting to hear back from Acer.

I have yet to activate the XP install, either, as I am having problems finding all of the drivers I need for it. I have a clone of the XP partition and was thinking I should try formatting it, removing the the XP boot files from the Vista C) partition, then seeing if Vista will activate.

This one seems like a no brainer, but I thought I would see if anyone else has had similar problems activating Vista when setting up a dual boot and could possibly steer me in the right direction.

Thanks in advance for any input people may have.

 

[RebateMonger]

Have you tried this Microsoft Hotfix? An Acer with pre-installed Vista shouldn't need to be activated, but apparently things sometimes go wrong.

 

[gba]

Thanks.. I did not think an OEM machine should have to be activated. This is the first new computer I ever bought (have built all of the rest). I am trying to mull my way through the mess now... looks like I am going to have to call Microsoft again

 

[Blazer]

http://forums.microsoft.com/Ge...default.aspx?SiteID=25

 

[gba]

very cool. thanks for the help.

I tried to install the update you linked, RM, but got a message saying it did not apply to me ('course not).

What I then did was restore to a recent image and took my proverbial two steps back. So far, so good...

I have removed Acer's bloatware for a second time (setting up a new laptop can seem an awful lot like a recurring nightmare). I am about to make a new image, then will install SP2 beta for a second time. If things go kablooie again, I will hit the forum you have linked, blazer. Thanks again, team.

Edit: Got my machine updated... no issues second time around.