I just found myself after a fresh install of Vista on new hardware (I updated the BIOS from 2005 to the current date/time during install), before I was ever able to even install drivers I got plagued with the Vista "ACTIVATE NOW OR DIE" dialog. Well, I obviously couldn't activate online as my wireless card's drivers weren't even installed! I sure as hell didn't want to wait on the phone for half an hour while reading off a 5,000 digit code, I just wanted to install my drivers and then activate online. Well, I wondered what "reduced functionality" meant so I clicked on it. Well, it gave me IE. Great, that'll help a lot when I don't have network access, right? Well, actually, it does! Go to File -> Open -> C:\Windows\Explorer.exe and execute as administrator and then, voila! That does it, now you have full control of your computer again (if you ignore that dialog). So now I was able to install my drivers, get internet connection going, and then activate online!
Hope this helps somebody else in the same scenario.
-Jax
Hope this helps somebody else in the same scenario.
-Jax
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