Uninstall/reinstall XP Home/Pro

claudio

Hi, would be grateful for some help.
Had a fatal error on my pc at home which had xp pro & ms office loaded (I got an IT guy in & the c drive is totally inaccessible). My son is giving me his old pc which has xp home installed as he's just bought a newer, more powerful machine with no operating system. I have the original installation discs and want to end up with:
a) xp pro & ms office on his old machine (which currently has xp home loaded)
b) xp home on his new machine.

I'm gussing that the operating systems are single user licences so not sure what to do.
Just got totally braindead last night on the Microsoft site.
Can anyone help a non-techie like me ?:doh:

Little_John

Legally
Microsoft licensing comes in 2 forms, OEM and retail. OEM is cheaper and is provided when you buy a new machine with windows installed. The reason it is cheper is that the licence dies with the PC and is none transferable. the retail licences are transferable.

You need to find out what licences you have before you install them on the machines.

Why did he buy a PC without operating system? I expect it was becasue he had windows installed on his old PC and thought he could transfer it. He needs to check the type of licence . I think the stickers on the side of the pc will tell you if it is OEM or not.

Not quite so legal
Just install it and if your caught act numb and go buy a copy of windows XP for each machine you get a period to fix any licencing issues should you be inspected.

devizes18193

do you still Have your disks , if so can you just get a new hard drive ?, Xp is a single user ,it might be possable to get multi user licence but knowing ms it would be costly. Failing all this why not put open office on your son's old pc

johnmc

The "licence" is the sticker on the PC. As it can only be on one PC at a time it is "single user"

Swap the stickers to the relevant machines and load them up. It may complain when you try to register it. Phone MS and explain that it is to replace a PC which has died and gone to the scrap yard.

Unless you have to use Access then why not give Open Office a try? It's FREE!!

claudio

Many thanks for such a quick reply from all of you-I'll check the stickers when I get home. Do I have to unistall xp Home on the old (working) pc and then reinstall the xp Pro or will the machine just think that it's un upgrade?
I guess that I also have to go through the activation process again ???

Little_John

What a load of crap answers this is why unsuspecting people end up in the !!!! with software piracy.

It is a very common mistake to assume that the little sticker on the side of the pc is the licence it is a certificate of authenticity if you read the sticker it tells you that. the Licence is usually a piece of A5 paper with Licence printed at the top. 95% of people throw it away thinking the sticker is the licence. Some of the newer stickers also say they are "proof of licence"

Transferring the sticker doesn’t mean you can transfer the licence; the stickers are designed to fall apart if you try to remove them anyway.

In the case of multi user licences you receive a similar piece of A5 paper stating the number of licenses. a multi user licence can only be used on the number of pc's it says they are for if you buy OEM multi user licences the licence dies with the PC they can't be transferred to a new PC. same with a single user OEM licence.

Retail licences you know the ones where you go to PC world or staples and buy them in a box they can be transferred from pc to pc as long as the old pc is no longer in use. they usually cost 2-3 times as much as an OEM licence.

It is the same for office the new 2007 professional version costs about £180 for the OEM licence with media The full retail version costs £370. They can both only be installed on 1 PC at a time but the retail version if you scrap that PC you can install it legally on the new PC the OEM version you would need to buy a new licence for the new PC.

claudio wrote: »

Many thanks for such a quick reply from all of you-I'll check the stickers when I get home. Do I have to unistall xp Home on the old (working) pc and then reinstall the xp Pro or will the machine just think that it's un upgrade?
I guess that I also have to go through the activation process again ???

There is no uninstall for windows, if you want to install windows from fresh you just put the windows CD in the drive and the PC will see the bootable CD and ask if you want to boot to it hit a key to start the setup process, it will come to a point asking what you want to do with the drives, delete the partitions and recreate them (its easier than it sounds) and install windows from scratch. I wouldnt do an upgrade it is always best to wipe and start again.
If you want to prevent data being stolen then destroy the hard drive, if your not bothered just stick it in the bin. Personally I would remove the drive and keep it so no one can get the info off it.

claudio

Thanks to Little John for explaining about the legality.Decided to install XP Home on new pc and if prompted to activate, phone Microsoft call centre. If I need to buy a new operating system, then so be it.
But with XP disc in tray, I get 'reboot & select proper boot device or insert boot media in selected boot device & press any key'. Pressing any key just gives me same message ???
Read up on BIOS, went into set up and found:'quick boot enabled' and '1st boot device CD/DVD'. Don't know what to do.
Help......

Jzpop

You need to set the BIOS to '1st boot device CD/DVD', then choose Save & Exit (usually but not always the F10 key. The PC will then check if there is anything it can use in the CD drive before it checks anywhere else. Assuming that the XP disc is readable (i.e. not too badly scratched or smudged) it will start the installation process from the XP CD

computerwoman

you have to tell the pc what to do, so you want it to load up from cd/dvd so go with the 1st boot cd/dvd
this should start to install
cw
you beat me to it.
lol

claudio

Disc only used once to install on old machine. Just to repeat, the current settings in BIOS are 'quick boot enabled' and '1st boot device CD/DVD'. If this isn't right, could someone guide me thru' it please.

Donnie

Either it's not a bootable CD or there is a problem. Have you checked your private messages?