MS Licensing...

[Moshup Trail]

I bought a used laptop on eBay. It came with XP Pro, but no disks, CDs, or
documentation.

Do I own the license for XP Pro?


Assuming I do, Is there any way to switch the XP Pro license to my desktop?

 

[D.Currie]

I bought a used laptop on eBay. It came with XP Pro, but no disks, CDs, or
documentation.

Do I own the license for XP Pro?

Do you have the cd-key? What brand it the laptop, and what did it come when
it was factory-new?

Assuming I do, Is there any way to switch the XP Pro license to my desktop?

According to the EULA, if it's oem, no; if it's retail, yes.

However, unless you have the CDs and the CD key, you have no way to install
or reinstall the software, so there's no way to transfer it, much less
reinstall it on the laptop should something go wrong there.

If you have the CD key and the software is OEM, it might have been one of
the brands that puts the recovery on a partition on the hard drive rather
than supplying CDs. In that case,. you've probably got a legal license to
the software for the laptop. You still should have gotten some documentation
with it, though.

 

[Moshup Trail]

bottom-posted:

Do you have the cd-key? What brand it the laptop, and what did it come when
it was factory-new?



According to the EULA, if it's oem, no; if it's retail, yes.

However, unless you have the CDs and the CD key, you have no way to install
or reinstall the software, so there's no way to transfer it, much less
reinstall it on the laptop should something go wrong there.

If you have the CD key and the software is OEM, it might have been one of
the brands that puts the recovery on a partition on the hard drive rather
than supplying CDs. In that case,. you've probably got a legal license to
the software for the laptop. You still should have gotten some documentation
with it, though.

To muddy the waters, the laptop seems to have been packaged by Dell with
Win2000 Pro. The XP Pro seems to be a retail upgrade.

When I go to My Computer/Properties I can see a long number. Is that the CD
key?

Of course all this may be moot without disks, but I thought if worse came to
worse could I go to Microsoft and request (even paying a small fee)
"replacement" CD's?

 

[Carey Frisch [MVP]]

If you did not receive a Windows XP CD or documentation,
then an improper license transfer has occurred. As a result,
you do not have a valid license to use Windows XP. You'll
have to purchase a regular "Full Version" of Windows XP.

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User

Be Smart! Protect your PC!
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


|I bought a used laptop on eBay. It came with XP Pro, but no disks, CDs, or
| documentation.
|
| Do I own the license for XP Pro?
|
|
| Assuming I do, Is there any way to switch the XP Pro license to my desktop?

 

[nobody]

You obviously can't transfer XP Pro to your desktop as you don't have the cd
but if your laptop is functioning properly with XP Pro and you can go online
and do updates then I would say you have a valid product key, cd or no cd.
You can always try and find someone to burn you a copy. If you want to find
the product key just google for "magic jelly bean", it's an app that will
find the key.

 

[Sharon F]

To muddy the waters, the laptop seems to have been packaged by Dell with
Win2000 Pro. The XP Pro seems to be a retail upgrade.

When I go to My Computer/Properties I can see a long number. Is that the CD
key?

Of course all this may be moot without disks, but I thought if worse came to
worse could I go to Microsoft and request (even paying a small fee)
"replacement" CD's?

Contact the seller from eBay and ask for the original OEM CDs. If no go,
give Dell a call to see if you can get replacements for at least the
Win2000 that originally shipped on the machine.

Technically, the seller should have uninstalled XP from the laptop if they
intended to keep the retail CD. You could try to work out a deal with them
but it is probably just easier to buy your own copy.

 

[D.Currie]

bottom-posted:


To muddy the waters, the laptop seems to have been packaged by Dell with
Win2000 Pro. The XP Pro seems to be a retail upgrade.

When I go to My Computer/Properties I can see a long number. Is that the CD
key?

Of course all this may be moot without disks, but I thought if worse came to
worse could I go to Microsoft and request (even paying a small fee)
"replacement" CD's?

The seller probably kept the CDs and key to use on his own system, or worse
yet is selling multiple systems with this same version of XP loaded. There's
little chance MS would do anything for you, as the original owner didn't
actually transfer the software to you, and it's likely to still be in use on
another computer.

You're really better off getting your own copy of XP and doing a nice clean
load on the laptop. If you just wanted to do a repair install on the laptop,
you could go with the upgrade version, but if you ever wanted to do a clean
install, you'd have to have a previous version, and you don't even have
that.

You might want to contact Dell and see if you can get the 2000 CD for the
computer. That would be a good place to start, and depending on what they
say, you could then decide if you want to upgrade it to XP or leave it
as-is.

 

[Moshup Trail]

bottom-posted:

If you did not receive a Windows XP CD or documentation,
then an improper license transfer has occurred. As a result,
you do not have a valid license to use Windows XP. You'll
have to purchase a regular "Full Version" of Windows XP.

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User

Be Smart! Protect your PC!
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/

-------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------


|I bought a used laptop on eBay. It came with XP Pro, but no disks, CDs, or
| documentation.
|
| Do I own the license for XP Pro?
|
|
| Assuming I do, Is there any way to switch the XP Pro license to my desktop?

Hey all, thanks. Sounds like if I don't have the CD, I don't really have
the license. I can probably run the laptop until something goes wrong, then
I'll need to get some kind of OS license. Good suggestion - go back to
Dell and see if I can get the w2k CD's. Probably best done BEFORE something
goes wrong! Then if I really want xp-pro I can buy an upgrade instead of
the full version. I'll write the eBay seller, but I don't have much hope as
the item was specifically listed with no OS.

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Greetings --

If you did not receive the installation media, the CoA, and the
Product Key, then you did not receive a legitimate license for the OS.
If that was supposed to be part of the deal, contact the seller and
eBay to file a complaint. If the seller is in the same country as
you, you may also be able to prefer criminal charges for mail and/or
wire fraud. Contact your local authorities to learn of your options.

Bruce Chambers

--
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