XP Home Re-Install Question

[04nmr85]

Alright, so my friend had me build him a computer not so long ago. He previously had a Compaq with XP Home installed in it. He saved his hard drive from his old computer in the one that i built him but everything else in this new computer was, well new. Both hard drives have been completely reformatted in the process of setting up this new computer.

My question is, Would the XP licsense that was included with his Compaq computer still be a valid liscense? If I could find a XP Home install disc (he lost his other ones), could i legally install WinXp Home with that liscense key?

[Negeva]

The XP licence is OEM with the Compaq and thus tied to that machine. If memory serves I don't think COmpaq do the bios tweaks etc that Dell do with their disks. I have transfered a HP licence to another machine and called Microsoft to explain the transfer of software due to a dead motherboard in old HP machine and they allowed activation.

Might have just been a one off.

[sdkfz]

If the XP came with the Compaq preinstalled then no, the software is legally tied to the Compaq and likely technologically tied to it also, this of course assuming that you made a copy of the restore disk which was likely on a partition of the computer's hard drive. The license will have an OEM key sequence in it. Contact Compaq to get another disk, but during the install it will search for a Comapq bios and refuse to install without it.

On the other hand the XP was bought as a stand alone product then if retail- all you need is a another disk of the same sort to use the license, ie a home edition upgrade disk for the one he has a license for. If an OEM copy bought separately say from Newegg.com then legally it was tied to the Compaq, but you can install it on the new PC once again with another disk of the same type.

[04nmr85]

So basically he's just better off getting a new, upgrade version of XP Home from Newegg? The only thing left from his old Compaq is the hard drive(in use), motherboard(in my posession) and processor(in my posession). The case, cd drives and floppy drive were given to me to deal with. I actually cut the XP Home liscense key sticker off of the plastic part of the case it was stuck on. Is the liscense key sticker pretty much useless now?

[glc]

It's a gray area. The Compaq license is only for the Compaq computer it was delivered with. Is what you have now legally able to still be called a Compaq? I honestly don't know.