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How do I backup my retail Vista activation?

S

slicksilver

Golden Member
Is there a way to do this? I keep formatting and reinstalling for a various reasons and it wont activate automatcally online because it has been activated more than 5 times. Instead I have to call MS everytime and get it activated which is a pain in the ***.
 
Not that I am aware of. Your best solution is to stop all the formatting and reinstalling nonsense and do it right and be done with it.
 
problem is I dont like to do it but forced to do it because of the crapware which comes with new pcs. Now I've purchased Ghost and am hoping I wont have to do it again. Just a quick question, If I call MS too many times will MS block my key or something?
 
Originally posted by: rajkanneganti
How do I backup my retail Vista activation?
Click to expand...

There is no way to backup the XP activation anymore. I doubt that you can do it with Vista.
But:

When time comes to activate, disconnect from the internet and click on "Activate".
It will let you activate by phone.
After having entered the numbers you get from the automated system into the form, before completing the process, take a screen capture of the activation window and save.

Every time you need to activate the same license on the same hardware again, you can do the same but don't have to call anymore. Just enter the numbers from the screen capture.

 
You have a 30-day grace period after install before having to activate. Generally it's a good idea to not activate until the 20th day or so to make sure you won't have to use up activations.

The activation 'limit' etc gets reset after some time so if you have your box stable for 6 months you might not have to deal with manual activation next time.
 
I'm surprised someone doesn't have a utility for this.

I'd say I was surprised that Microsoft didn't have a function for this, but expecting ANYTHING to make sense and be user friendly from Microsoft is clearly asking for the impossible.

After all if the activation data is locked to particulars of your hardware then what's the problem with backing up and restoring that easily? If the hardware changes it won't be valid and will reactivate, but if it hasn't changed then one might as well be given an easy way to keep using the activation one had done previously before the reformat!

As for making people call in over and over and over all I can say is F*#*! Microsoft and use LINUX; using their product that you've paid good money for isn't some kind of privilege that you should have to plead for over the phone wasting your time over and over again.

IIRC with XP there was a WPA.DBL file in C:\Windows\System32 or something like that that could be backed up and which would help keep the activation. I thought I had seen one of those in Vista but I forget at the moment.
There are also various DigitalProductId and related keys in the registry that contain bits about your activated key and activation and so on along with other registry keys in the various registry folders related to that sort of thing. Backing up those, whatever wpa.dbl file there may be, keeping your system SID the same, keeping the volume serial number on the discs might help.

Of course if you set up a freshly installed system, get it just the way you want it except adding anti-virus software and other sorts of time-based things, then doing an image backup of C: before you add in lots of other data / programs gives you something you can just reinstall from quickly to get back to that exact state of activation and system configuration with an image restore. Then you just have to add in the bulk of your user data or whatever which could just be put on D: to keep it apart.

 
Originally posted by: QuixoticOne
As for making people call in over and over and over all I can say is F*#*! Microsoft and use LINUX; using their product that you've paid good money for isn't some kind of privilege that you should have to plead for over the phone wasting your time over and over again.
Click to expand...

And how often does the Joe Consumer reinstall their computer? I believe most people have never had to call because automatic activation worked fine.
 
I think this is the best way to do it. Now how do I get that number which I input earlier when I did the telephone activation?
 
Originally posted by: rajkanneganti
I think this is the best way to do it. Now how do I get that number which I input earlier when I did the telephone activation?
Click to expand...

You need to go through activation once and save the numbers given to you over the phone.
If you have not done that, you will need to call and go through the activation.
Make sure to have the image saved on another partition or hard drive, or print it.

Both numbers are on the form (the activation ID that you input and the code given to you over the phone) before you go to the next step.


 
Originally posted by: rajkanneganti
Originally posted by: Navid
Originally posted by: Gooberlx2
The ABR tool listed in this forum should suffice. I used it when switching from x32 to x64 Vista.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the link. :cookie:
Will read soon.
Click to expand...

Doesn't work for retail versions. Only OEM versions.
Click to expand...

ooohhhhh....that sucks. I'm rather surprised there's any difference, since I had to download and burn a x64 DVD...which I assume would have been the same as any other x64 DVD. It must get farked during the backup portion.
 
Originally posted by: rajkanneganti
Doesn't work for retail versions. Only OEM versions.
Click to expand...
Ehh...I thought you said the reason for all these re-activations was due to the crapware preinstalled on OEM computers? OEM computers would use the OEM BIOS SLP pre-activation method that ARB relies on to work.

Further, if you clean installed Vista on the OEM computer, the crapware would be gone. That only makes one re-activation, where did the other 'more than four' come from?
 
Originally posted by: tcsenter
Originally posted by: rajkanneganti
Doesn't work for retail versions. Only OEM versions.
Click to expand...
Ehh...I thought you said the reason for all these re-activations was due to the crapware preinstalled on OEM computers? OEM computers would use the OEM BIOS SLP pre-activation method that ARB relies on to work.

Further, if you clean installed Vista on the OEM computer, the crapware would be gone. That only makes one re-activation, where did the other 'more than four' come from?
Click to expand...

Yeah. Its more complicated than that. Lenovo asks u to use a system update utility to get all the drivers for the pc but installs crapware with them as well. So now I've got the drivers individually and now want to do it all over again.
 
Just install and activate it then take an image with HDD imaging software (I use Acronis). It's faster than reinstalling too.

But seriously, why are you reinstalling your OS so many times? Unless you work for a site that benchmarks hardware or something, I can't imagine a reason for doing this. Not since Win9x has it been really necessary to reinstall an OS so frequently.
 
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