Chef Garry

Join Date 05/2002

Advice needed re XP license

I have XP Home on my computer and I picked up XP Pro for $10 with an education discout at the college where I work. A friend is running Win 98 and (surprise) has no end of trouble. Is it legal for me to upgrade to XPPro on my home machine and load/reregister my XP Home copy on my friends machine?

The doing is easy, the legality I'm not sure of. If I do what I'm asking, would I be better off registering the Home version in my name or can I tell MS that it has been gifted to my friend?

Thanks

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MikeB314

Join Date 07/2001

+40

It depends on whether you purchased a full version of XP Pro or an upgrade. If you bought a full version, then you should be able to give your XP Home license away. If you bought an upgrade, then you need to keep your XP Home license. The full version of the XP Pro CD is capable of doing a full install or an upgrade, your choice. However, I'm not sure if XP Home is capable of being upgraded to Pro.

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MikeB314

Join Date 07/2001

+40

Ok, now I'm sure. XP Home can be upgraded to XP Pro.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/howtobuy/upgrading/matrix.asp

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Thanks Mike. The Home version is an upgrade but the Pro is full version. I'm more concerned about MS's view re giving the Home version away. When I install it on my friends machine, it will certainly detect it is a different machine. I expect I'll have to phone the registration in?

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MikeB314

Join Date 07/2001

+40

That I'm not sure about. You might find some information on it here: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;[ln];302806

It all sounds perfectly legal to me though. You might just want to email Microsoft support and find out the procedure for tranfering a license.

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MS doesn't care if you give your licensed copy away to someone else, they just want to make sure it's not being used on more than one PC which is the reason for activation. So as you know, you do need to deal with MS re: activation and registration. Ordinarily both can be done online, but I don't know if you can do that online in a case where you're actually transferring it over to a new user/PC entirely. Best to contact MS support for the procedure.

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I have had to call MS several times. I used up all my activations. 14 I think. It resets after 120 days.
Anyway, it's not a big deal. They don't ask any personal questions. They might ask if you've upgraded your computer or reformatted your hard drive, etc. It just takes a few minutes to read the numbers to them and type in the numbers they give you.

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Thanks for the input. It seems the best thing is to Email Customer Service and run it by them to be sure. I'll report back when I get an answer so y'all know what happens.

thanks

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