Does an upgrade install stuff the previous install?

[Catweazle]

Use an Upgrade install Windows disk to do a fresh install and you gotta pop a qualifying Windows CD in for verification. That's a no-brainer. That means, legally anyway, that the license attached to the earlier Windows CD is now void. That's a no-brainer too. What I'm wondering is, has that earlier installation actually become a problem?

I've never tried it, so here's the scenario:

* You have XP Home installed on a system.
* You put together another system and grab an Upgrade version XP Pro, cause it's cheap.
* You install your new PC, popping the XP Home CD in to allow the install to go ahead.

Okay, so you bent the rules a bit. But did you really stuff things up? Is that XP Home installation going to start spitting up "Genuine Advantage" warnings?


I've never tried it. I don't even have an XP Home installation current here to check it out with. Has anybody here tried doing that, and were there problems?

This is simply an idea that popped into my head, and now I'm curious to know the answer.

 

[djnes]

If I'm understanding right, you have (theoretically) one computer running XP Home, and you want to use the XP Home CD on a second, new computer, just to allow the XP Pro Upgrade to continue? I'm not sure of the legality of this, in terms of the EULA, but it won't screw up your initial PC with XP Home installed. That will be fine, and will be unaffected, in terms of WGA, etc.

 

[Catweazle]

Yep, you got the scenario correct.

It was merely an academic exercise, born of an idea which came up during conversation. I didn't want to be bothered with doing some fresh installs to check the results, so I asked here in case anybody actually knew the answer.

I suspected it'd work without problems for the install. (It definitely violates the license terms.)

Thanks for the quick reply