Cold day in [H]ell when...

Soarin

Soarin

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Well recently a customer of mine his PC took a crap (not pleasant mind you, I do not like cleaning up all the little bits). Well we order a new pc from hp, but the pc needed to be windows xp not windows 7. He is a tax accountant mind you. Well HP was suppose to send xp downgrade media, they did not. This was after the thing back ordered for a week.

Well i contacted my sales rep that gave me a nice discount on the shipping. She was not told anything about discontinued downgrade rights. So this is the email she sent me
"-------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Waldron, Amanda"
Date: Feb 7, 2011 11:33 AM
Subject: HP XP downgrade



Dave -

Just got your voicemail. I figured it would be easier to send this info to you through e-mail -

I'm not sure why Tech Support couldn't send out a disk to you. I've touched base with our Microsoft specialist. You can call the Microsoft Activation Center at 1-888-352-7140 to get the product key code, or she said you could use an xpp product key from another system you have (on your e-mail you mentioned you have XP disks?).

I apologize for the headache this has become - If tech support discontinued their XP media, then we were not made aware.

I did see the computer itself has shipped (see attached e-mail).

Call me if this issue does not get resolved!
_________________________________________________

Amanda Waldron
Hewlett-Packard, Small and Medium Business
Inside Sales Representative
Phone: 1-800-277-8988

Now i have never heard of a company saying use a keycode from old pc...
Hp has gotten lazy it seems. lol
 
Well if you had another HP around that has an XP key, you could use it. Heh, it does seem a bit lazy. Then again, maybe they did discontinue it?
 
Aye, thought of that BUT i do not. His old PC was an acer, and they told me to use that key code. Well i do not have the machine here, and the key-code isn't working, and MS is asking for the code on the COA label. (not the key-code) and I do not have it lol. What a day, and my boss wont call and tell me that code.....To busy with baby i think,,,,,Anyways i posted this because i though it was humorous.
 
What media are you attempting to install that Acer cd key with? They problem is that the media needs to be similar to what Acer used to initialy build out the PC, so OEM software of the same service pack. (SP should be listed on the sticker from the Acer).

Any reason not to go 7pro and use XP mode or XP on a VM?
 
The media is xp pro sp0 or OEM. I have a valid code (Was on phone with MS for hours) they are not sure why it isnt working. Now this media has been used before on another computer with that computers keycode. Also oem, worked fine too.

The reason to not use VM is because I guess he has ncomputing also, BUT really i am not sure, I though the l130 device supported 7 but, his software may be a PITA . 15 cd's total to install, the horror.... (P.S I have done this before on his other HP machine, its a bitch) All that clicking and options...... My mind was blown.:eek:
Anyways i will run that by my boss because if i do not have to use xp i wont lol. Hell it was pan enough with the slipstream of the sata drivers... lol
 
I like how HP is basicallyt telling you to violate the EULA by using an OEM key tied to a whole difffernet brand of machine to use on their HP.
 
Exactly lol. Well i finally found another dead acer in the shop with xp pro and used it and it worked. lol
 
Although this sounds flaky, as hell, this has been the standard downgrade installation procedure since They started it with Vista Business. The idea is to intentionally get an OS installed on the machine with the intention of it failing activation, so you have an opportunity to call microsoft. Over the phone, they will verify your you have a legitimate version of 7 or vista that qualifies for downgrade, and then give you an activation code. A Windows XP key is never actually issued to my knowledge, so if you ever need to reinstall Windows XP in the future, you get to look forward to going through the same procedure. Certainly not a great route to go, but if you absolutely have to have XP running natively on your hardware, it's one way of doing it.

I'd also like to correct a little misinformation in this thread. Although there are several variations of windows install cd's for different distribution methods (oem, retail, corporate, WGA, etc), the service pack does not matter. Also, XP discs that natively have SP3 will ask for the key at the time of installation, but do not require it, making this process a bit easier.
 
Did you check the smaller inside box (Not the keyboard box) for the dvds? I have had systems come in from HP that were downgraded, where Win 7 would be the installed OS. I would have to install XP from the media dvds.

I also wouldn't put it past HP to forget the disc. I had a customer who wanted Windows 7 installed, we ordered a downgrade, it came with XP on it, and the Win 7 media had a bad image on it.
 
It is getting harder to get machines with XP downgrade rights. The only ones I can find anymore are some Lenovo Thinkcentres now.
 
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