ms windows cd key

[sonoma1993]

Currently microsoft windows xp uses a 25 digit alphanumetic cd key. How much longer til microsoft will have to increase the cd key from 25 digit to let say 35, or 40 digits?

 

[diapickle]

wouldn't be necessary because they would never sell that many copies

 

[JustAnAverageGuy]

Not for a very, very, very long time.

 

[RebateMonger]

What is that? 9 numeric characters plus twenty-six alpha characters = 35 characters possible for each digit.

35 to the 25th power? Something like 10e38 permutations? A BIG number!
Microsoft probably uses some kind of parity checking, which cuts down on the options slightly (maybe by a factor of 1000).

 

[JustAnAverageGuy]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
What is that? 9 numeric characters plus twenty-six alpha characters = 35 characters possible for each digit.

35 to the 25th power? Something like 10e38 permutations? A BIG number!
Microsoft probably uses some kind of parity checking, which cuts down on the options slightly (maybe by a factor of 1000).

0-9 is ten numeric characters.

 

[sonoma1993]

thing is for the cd-key, only certain combinations work. if you were to flip couple numbers and letter around, most likely the key will become invalid.

let say you had dt6ks-8fjsr-jss5n-rnw1f-a3fnw for a valid cd-key for xp professioanl full retail editon. If you were to change a dt6ks to like t6ksd the whole cd key would become invalid then.

In theory anything you type into the cd-key boxes should work but they it doesnt.

 

[JustAnAverageGuy]

Originally posted by: sonoma1993
thing is for the cd-key, only certain combinations work. if you were to flip couple numbers and letter around, most likely the key will become invalid.

let say you had dt6ks-8fjsr-jss5n-rnw1f-a3fnw for a valid cd-key for xp professioanl full retail editon. If you were to change a dt6ks to like t6ksd the whole cd key would become invalid then.

In theory anything you type into the cd-key boxes should work but they it doesnt.

This is true.

They have over 8e38 (that's 8 with 38 zeros after it (read 800,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000) choices though.

It's not hard to just say, oh, let's just pick every 20 trillionth key. It doesn't work like that, but the point is, they aren't going to run out of possible combinations any time soon.

 

[htne]

I remember one Microsoft product (Windows 95?), where the secret was sum 7. The cd key was all numeric, you just added all of the single digits together, and the last digit of the sum had to be 7. I'm sure it is much more complex now, but I have no idea how complex.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: JustAnAverageGuy

0-9 is ten numeric characters.

Actually, we may both be wrong, since Microsoft probably doesn't use "zero", may not use "one", and may not use "eye", "oh", and, maybe, a couple of other characters. They are too easy to cause mixups. The choices may be eight numeric and twenty-four alpha characters. Maybe less. But the permutations are still bigger than my salary.

Now the real question:
Why does Microsoft use a FIFTY-DIGIT-LONG code when you call in for phone activation?
I guess because that's the length of the checksum that the hardware auditing software uses to characterize your computer?

 

[jlbenedict]

they should just stick with the famous Windows NT install code, All ones , 111-11111111

 

[talyn00]

Originally posted by: diapickle
wouldn't be necessary because they would never sell that many copies

cd keys length has nothing to do with number of copies of windows sold.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: talyn00

Originally posted by: diapickle
wouldn't be necessary because they would never sell that many copies

cd keys length has nothing to do with number of copies of windows sold.

Implicitly, it does, because they have to have at least one valid key per copy of Windows, and they would probably like the valid keys to be fairly 'sparse' (so that you can't just randomly try keys until you get one that works).

You need to have a cd-key length such that the number of possible keys is significantly larger than the number of valid keys you need, and the number of valid keys you need depends on how many copies of the software you want to sell.

 

[theMan]

they dont check against having bad words in the cd keys apparently. i had a windows 98 disk that one of the things was FCUK'D (appostrophe added). that was the funniest thing ever. i wonder where that disk is.

 

[JustAnAverageGuy]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
Originally posted by: JustAnAverageGuy

0-9 is ten numeric characters.

Actually, we may both be wrong, since Microsoft probably doesn't use "zero", may not use "one", and may not use "eye", "oh", and, maybe, a couple of other characters. They are too easy to cause mixups. The choices may be eight numeric and twenty-four alpha characters. Maybe less. But the permutations are still bigger than my salary.

True. Point conceded. Regardless, it is still one huge number that I don't even know the name for.

Now the real question:
Why does Microsoft use a FIFTY-DIGIT-LONG code when you call in for phone activation?
I guess because that's the length of the checksum that the hardware auditing software uses to characterize your computer?

The first set of numbers identifies what operating system is it.

XP Home OEM
XP Home Retail
XP Pro OEM
XP Pro Retail
etc

The rest, as far as I know, register the internal components of your computer such as Display Adapter, SCSI adapter, IDE adapter, Network adapter MAC, RAM, Processor type, processor serial number, HDD, HDD Serial, optical drives (From Microsoft's Site. )

You can change up to six of these (4 if one of them is the network adapter), and still have a fully activated OS.