Tag: reactivate

Transferring Windows XP Activation Information

July 26, 2007 by Jason

To tell you the truth, I have never understood what the big deal is with product activation. The fact of the matter is that software piracy is fairly rampant and that Microsoft is the target for a large percentage of the piracy due to their dominance in the operating system and office productivity software markets. They have a right to try to stop or at least control that privacy and the product activation seems to be a fair way of ensuring that only legitimate software owners get to benefit from using it.

All that said, I know that there are many users who abhor the process. It may be because they have had problems activating and have had to call the toll-free number and wait to talk to a Microsoft support agent who then read them some 278-character long (okay- it’s a slight exaggeration) activation code. Read More»

XP Product Activation

February 03, 2007 by Jason

Windows XP and Office XP use Product Activation to reduce piracy.

On installation (of non corporate editions) they create a snapshot of the PC is hardware which covers:

Boot disk volume serial number
Network adaptor MAC address
CD-ROM drive ID data
Graphics card ID data
IDE adaptor ID data
SCSI adaptor ID data
Hard disk ID data
Processor Model and serial number
Amount of RAM
Dockable (laptop) or not (desktop)
Read More»