Hi,

 

I get a message on an old installation of XP Home that 'Windows needs to

be activated'. This follows a major crash, where the power-supply and

motherboard bundle had to be replaced because the machine wouldn't boot at

all. When I click 'OK', the machine things for a few seconds and then tells

me that Windows is already activated ... pressing 'OK' takes me back to the

log-in screen. I can get into Windows OK through Safe Mode, where the

message doesn't appear - but not through Nomal Mode. Any help or advice

would be appreciated - the installation is about 4 years old, and appears to

have run perfectly up until this disaster occurred.

 

Any help or suggestions would be most welcome.

 

Cheers,

 

Philip

Hi,

 

When major hardware change is detected, Windows would need to reactivate.

 

Since your reactivation is confused, try the steps provided in the article

below:

 

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/328874/

 

Thanks,

Obaid.

 

 

"Philip Andrews" wrote:

> Hi,

>

> I get a message on an old installation of XP Home that 'Windows needs to

> be activated'. This follows a major crash, where the power-supply and

> motherboard bundle had to be replaced because the machine wouldn't boot at

> all. When I click 'OK', the machine things for a few seconds and then tells

> me that Windows is already activated ... pressing 'OK' takes me back to the

> log-in screen. I can get into Windows OK through Safe Mode, where the

> message doesn't appear - but not through Nomal Mode. Any help or advice

> would be appreciated - the installation is about 4 years old, and appears to

> have run perfectly up until this disaster occurred.

>

> Any help or suggestions would be most welcome.

>

> Cheers,

>

> Philip

>

>

>

>

Replacing the motherboard changes enough hardware to almost guarrantee

triggering re-activation.

 

Further, replacing the motherboard almost always requires a "repair"

installation of XP, **before** booting into XP, to get the right hardware

drivers installed. It is almost amazing that XP functions at all, unless

the old and new motherboards were the same model.

 

If the PC came with XP pre-installed from a major PC vendor (e.g., Dell,

Gateway), then the copy of XP was probably BIOS-locked. If you change the

motherboard, the BIOS software changes, and thus the activation fails. The

only ways to replace a motherboard on such a PC, without buying a new

verison of XP, is to let the original PC maker do it.

 

If the PC was home-built, with a full-retail (or retail upgrade) version of

XP, then you can re-activate as many times as you want. So, just

re-activate. See below, if you are in an activation loop.

 

If the PC was home-built using an OEM version of XP (cheaper than retail by

about $100), then that verison is locked to the original hardware. There is

no provision in the license to replace the motherboard, even if it dies.

However, I have heard that if you call the 800 number that should appear on

the activation screen, then sometimes you can talk the Microsoft

representative into giving you the code to re-activate.

 

In your case, the activation software apears to be somewhat confused, since

it permits safe mode. If this is a retail version of XP, you could try a

"repair" installation, which should refresh the XP system files, hopefully

including the activation software. If it is OEM version of XP, a repair is

generall not possible, but check with the PC merndor to be sure. If OEM and

no repair, then there should ber some way to restore the PC to day-one, at

the cost of losing all your personal data. But, if you can get into safe

mode, then you can copy that off of the PC, before the restore.

 

If what you call safe mode can not copy files, then that is really not the

normal safe mode. Other options to rescue files include "live" LINUX CDs,

such as KNOPPIX. These can boot a PC, without writing to the hard drive,

and copy files out to USB drives. KNOPPIX supports the NTFS file system

often used by XP, as well as FAT32. It does not care about XP file

permissions, but I do not believe that it can handle XP-encrypted files, if

you happended to use that feature.

 

One other idea: Try searching these newgroups, and others, for topics like

"false activation", "reactivation loop XP", etc. Somewhere I recall reading

something that sounded a bit like your problem, in which part of XP said to

activate, but another said that you were already activated. I found this

at: http://www.pcbuyerbeware.co.uk/ProductActivation.htm

 

The Product Activation data is kept in the wpa.dbl file in the

C:\Windows\System32 folder. If you have access to a master image or backup

copy of that file that was created when the PC was working properly, you can

boot into Safe Mode, open Windows Explorer, and copy the wpa.dbl file into

the C:\Windows\System32 folder. Reboot and you should be back in business.

If that doesn't work, boot into Safe Mode again and delete the wpa.dbl and

wpa.bak files, and reboot. With those files no longer there, Windows XP will

have to reactivate, because it reads them when it checks to see if it is

activated.

 

 

"Philip Andrews" <philipfaeunst@tiscali.co.uk> wrote in message

news:%23qB7KFwuHHA.1168@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...

> Hi,

>

> I get a message on an old installation of XP Home that 'Windows needs

> to

> be activated'. This follows a major crash, where the power-supply and

> motherboard bundle had to be replaced because the machine wouldn't boot at

> all. When I click 'OK', the machine things for a few seconds and then

> tells

> me that Windows is already activated ... pressing 'OK' takes me back to

> the

> log-in screen. I can get into Windows OK through Safe Mode, where the

> message doesn't appear - but not through Nomal Mode. Any help or advice

> would be appreciated - the installation is about 4 years old, and appears

> to

> have run perfectly up until this disaster occurred.

>

> Any help or suggestions would be most welcome.

>

> Cheers,

>

> Philip

>

>

>

Philip Andrews wrote:

> Hi,

>

> I get a message on an old installation of XP Home that 'Windows needs to

> be activated'. This follows a major crash, where the power-supply and

> motherboard bundle had to be replaced because the machine wouldn't boot at

> all.

 

Normally, and assuming a retail license (many factory-installed OEM

installations are BIOS-locked to a specific chipset and therefore are

*not* transferable to a new motherboard - check yours before starting),

unless the new motherboard is virtually identical (same chipset, same

IDE controllers, same BIOS version, etc.) to the one on which the WinXP

installation was originally performed, you'll need to perform a repair

(a.k.a. in-place upgrade) installation, at the very least:

 

How to Perform an In-Place Upgrade of Windows XP

http://support.microsoft.com/directory/article.asp?ID=KB;EN-US;Q315341

 

Changing a Motherboard or Moving a Hard Drive with WinXP Installed

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/moving_xp.html

 

The "why" is quite simple, really, and has nothing to do with

licensing issues, per se; it's a purely technical matter, at this point.

You've pulled the proverbial hardware rug out from under the OS. (If

you don't like -- or get -- the rug analogy, think of it as picking up a

Cape Cod style home and then setting it down onto a Ranch style

foundation. It just isn't going to fit.) WinXP, like Win2K before it,

is not nearly as "promiscuous" as Win9x when it comes to accepting any

old hardware configuration you throw at it. On installation it

"tailors" itself to the specific hardware found. This is one of the

reasons that the entire WinNT/2K/XP OS family is so much more stable

than the Win9x group.

 

As always when undertaking such a significant change, back up any

important data before starting.

 

This will also probably require re-activation, unless you have a

Volume Licensed version of WinXP Pro installed. If it's been more than

120 days since you last activated that specific Product Key, you'll most

likely be able to activate via the Internet without problem. If it's

been less, you might have to make a 5 minute phone call.

 

> When I click 'OK', the machine things for a few seconds and then tells

> me that Windows is already activated ... pressing 'OK' takes me back to the

> log-in screen. I can get into Windows OK through Safe Mode, where the

> message doesn't appear - but not through Nomal Mode. Any help or advice

> would be appreciated - the installation is about 4 years old, and appears to

> have run perfectly up until this disaster occurred.

>

 

 

--

 

Bruce Chambers

 

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