As the copy you previously had on your machine was an OEM from Dell you
should contact Dell. OEM copies are supported by the PC Manufacturer not
Microsoft. When you purchased your machine you should also have been given
recovery disks, if you haven't then there should be a recovery partition on
your hard drive. The Dell manual should have given instructions on how you
could have made a recovery disk. Obviously, as you are asking this question
it appears you neither have recovery disks and/or you never created a
recovery disk from any hidden partition on the hard drive, so you will need
to contact Dell to see if they can provide you with the disks; they may
charge for this.
Once you are back up and running may I suggest that you purchase a third
party imaging application such as Acronis True Image and then image the hard
drive to a set of DVDs. This is by far the simplest and safest way of
protecting your operating system and data.
--
--
John Barnett MVP
Associate Expert
Windows - Shell/User
Web:
http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org
Web:
http://vistasupport.mvps.org
The information in this mail/post is supplied "as is". No warranty of any
kind, either expressed or implied, is made in relation to the accuracy,
reliability or content of this mail/post. The Author shall not be liable for
any direct, indirect, incidental or consequential damages arising out of the
use of, or inability to use, information or opinions expressed in this
mail/post..
"Debnjoey" <Debnjoey@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:3B8E573A-7795-4E1D-AE90-11912D7F2961@microsoft.com...
> My hard drive (Dell Latitude D800 running WinXP Pro) crashed recently.
> The
> crash was physical/mechanical in nature and so the hard drive is ruined.
> I'll buy a new HD, but do I need to buy Windows again?
> When I purchased the laptop, did I purchase a license to run Windows on
> that
> particular machine or hard drive?
> If I am still entitled to run Windows without purchasing again, how would
> I
> go about contacting Microsoft for an XP Pro installation disc?
>
> Thanks for reading.