Stymied by XP Activation!

[KidDoc]

I don't know if I'm the first to post, but I wanted to tell you about Office XP getting me. I've got 2 PC's at my desk, each running 2 MS OS's (WinME/WinXP, and Win2K/WinME). I just got the XP Pro Upgrade, and was doing well while installing it on the first PC, and then got it onto the Win2K patition of my second PC. All of them activated just fine. Unfortunately, the darn thing won't let me activate it on the WinXP partition of the second PC.

I haven't even tried my laptop or my wife's computer.

Looks like Microsoft has (at least for now) been able to limit my use of Office XP on all of my personal PC's. They have succeeded in limiting the ability of the casual user to "share" software - even in his own house.

I doubt that I'll shell out another $300+ on another copy. Just have to live with Office 2000 on the other PC's - not that there's that much of a difference!

 

[Stripe]

Just a bump, and to subscribe to this thread. I want to buy & install XP pro on my desktop and laptop, of course I won't use both at the same time - promise.

 

[JuryDuty]

That's interesting--I've wondered if anyone has run into any challenges with this. Personally, I just bought a copy for each of my computers. With these ridiculous deals going on at Staples and OfficeMax, I got about 10 items free after rebate that I sold and paid for the price of each OfficeXP. Might as well--they're practically giving them to you.

 

[DefRef]

That's the plan of M$ - Screw the corporate users by forcing them into subscriptions and keep people from loading one copy on every computer in the house AND letting their friends bum it too.

Considering that piracy was instrumental in making Office apps ubiquitous, it's interesting to see this change in strategy.

It's all about the Benjamins, baby!

 

[Ladi]

My OfficeXP activated just fine on my laptop and desktop (per licensing agreements that allow you to install on both). I also know of many people who have installed the same legal copy on 5-8 machines. There is no *forcing* of subscription-based purchases; you can certainly buy Office XP as an 'unlimited' subscription. In any case, subscriptions aren't a terrible deal for many corporate environments who are used to paying support fees on a regular basis and who may as well get updated software while they're at it. And regardless of what software piracy has and hasn't done for popularizing software, that doesn't mean ANY company has the right to put up with and not try to stop it in their products.

Have you considered that this could be a Windows XP issue as you were able to activate it with no issues ME and 2K? After all, Windows XP is currently a BETA operating system NOT currently available to the general public.

~Ladi

 

[KidDoc]

Ladi -

I knew I could get two machines out of the deal (as you said), and maybe it is an WinXP issue, though I did get it onto XP on my first PC. I'll try it on my Laptop and my wife's PC, and see if I can get it to go.

Can't justify the time and energy to eBay my way out of paying for other copies. May wait for the price to go down, pick one up on eBay myself, or just stick with Office2K on the other machines. As I said, there isn't that big a difference, and my MBA program specified 2K anyway (of course I have two partitions on my laptop too)

I'll post it when I've tried the other machines.

KidDoc

 

[LordFortius]

I just had a suddden idea to get around product activation- what if you took the hard drives out of the computers you wanted to install XP on and put them all into the computer that you had a key for. Would you be able to install it on the other HD's, and then put them back in their respective computers, all using the same activation code? Or does the activation code take your hard drive into account as one of the things it uses? Or is it simply too much work? Maybe it is considering you can always just download a 100k or less crack to get around it...

 

[KidDoc]

Nope! I tried it on this laptop and it was a NO GO. MS is kindly informing me that this copy is installed on another PC. Looks like I'm limited to 1 1/2 PC's with this copy. I'll keep an eye open for h**ks.

KidDoc

 

[Wowie]

Of course, if Staples screws up your order royally, and lands up sending TWO copies of XP for the price of ONE, then you can get 4 computers - relatively legit.

Wowie!

 

[MrBond]

Lordfortius, that won't work. You'll be missing the stuff officexp writes to the registry/dll files, etc on each drive. I, for example, have my drive partitioned into a Windows-Only drive and an Apps drive. I install o2k on the apps drive. When I format my c: drive (as I often do), one of the programs I ALWAYS have to reinstall is office. It can't run w/o its beloved dll's and registry settings

I have heard MS will alow up to something like 15-20 installs on different configurations before you have to call them for a new ID. I am not totally sure about the validity of that. It would make sense, as each day enough people make hardware changes to their PC that it would be a major PITA for MS to get them all new IDs

 

[HansXP]

Office 2000 SR-1 and above has the same activation BS found in XP. You can get around it easily by calling MS and asking for another confirmination code. The telephone operators really don't care how many activations you have.

 

[Shack70]

aren't you supposed to be able to call them? Tell them that you istalled it and then upgraded your MB & Processor and tried to "re-install", but it wont let you. i thought I read that somewhere.