• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Which XP to buy?

K

KOKJ

n00b
Joined
Mar 2, 2008
Messages
29
I just finished building a PC for a family member, and they want a legal copy of XP Home. Do I buy OEM, Full install or what?

Also, who's got the cheapest deals on XP Home?
 
Look at Newegg for XP home and I am sure they will not be upgrading the system very often so just go with OEM and save a couple bucks.
Heres a link: XP Home SP2
 
Called Microsoft earlier and they said that with OEM, you can only install it once on one PC. If the motherboard or HDD dies, you'll have to buy another license. That sucks!
 
KOKJ said:
Called Microsoft earlier and they said that with OEM, you can only install it once on one PC. If the motherboard or HDD dies, you'll have to buy another license. That sucks!
Click to expand...

I haven't had that experience with the OEM version of XP Pro. A few weeks ago my Chaintech VNF4 Ultra, socket 939, motherboard started dying. I bought a new Asus A8N SLI-SE board from Tiger Direct (socket 939 is getting tough to find by the way :) ), and had no problems getting XP Pro re-installed on my computer.

I believe other people here have had similar experiences, usually with the worst-case scenario being they had to call Microsoft Tech. Support to get a new key. It is true however, that with the OEM license, it's tied to the computer it was originally installed on.
 
I'm just going to make them buy the full retail version. Thanks for the input!
 
KOKJ said:
I'm just going to make them buy the full retail version. Thanks for the input!
Click to expand...

Save your parents some money and buy the oem version. The oem license is locked to the motherboard once it is activated. But If the hard drive
dies you will not have to get another license. I know that from personal experience. I do not know why they told you that.
 
I've been using my OEM Windows XP license for a very long time. I got it on release day and have gone through ~12-15 motherboards since then. It hasn't locked me out of anything. The code even works just fine from a SP2 slipstreamed copy I created a few years ago. As long as you don't go throughthe activation more than every 3 months, it is not a problem. If you do, you have to call in, but that isn't so much trouble.

Vista is horrible about that I've had to call in for every Vista activation beyond my first 2 because of a motherboard change. As soon as the motherboard is changed, Vista doesn't activate by internet again, which is totally bogus. What's worse is the Vista activation is much longer. While I can activate XP in about 5 minutes onthe phone, Vista takes about 40 minutes.
 
Ive activated vista a few times over the phone and each time has been a quick 5-7 min call
 
zupahwez0e said:
Ive activated vista a few times over the phone and each time has been a quick 5-7 min call
Click to expand...

Reciting the code off to the computer voice recognition portion takes at least that long, and usually around 10 minutes for me because I have to pronounce slowly or it doesn't understand. Then there is the 20 minute wait for someone to come on the line. Finally, I get someone on the line and I have to tell them the code all over again and get the code from them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top