The foloowing is what I went through to transfer my Ultimate License to a new
LapTop. Some of the information is already mentioned in my earlier post. This
is more of a step by step history. (with a happy ending)
1.First I went to windows marketplace.com, at the top of the page is a
button for your digital locker. Click the add button.
2.I clicked on install and started the process.
3.I inserted the windows anytime upgrade disk that came with the new laptop.
4.When the prompt came up on the screen I clicked on setup.exe.
5.The upgrade began. It took about 4 hours to complete. During the process
do not hit any keys or take out the disk, and finally a screen will appear
saying completion. The screen will go blank at times with only the mouse
pointer showing, again don’t touch anything. There are multiple reboots and
during the re-boots a screen will appear saying press any key to boot from
CD/DVD don’t touch it! The boot menus will appear and disappear on their own.
You’ll even get the time zones setup screen prompt, answer that information.
You will then get some more blank blue Vista background screens for a while.
Then you’ll get some words appearing on the screen telling you what it’s
doing and some advertising for Windows Vista and its abilities. Eventually
you will get a sign on screen. Go ahead and sign on and a display will say
preparing your desktop, when that is done you will get your desk top. Then
Vista will install downloads and updates. When prompted to restart, remove
the CD DVD and reboot. Now, you’re almost done.
6.The next step is to activate Windows Vista ultimate.
7.This is where my problems began! In trying to activate it I received a
message that this product key is already in use. To make a very long story
short, HP was totally useless in helping me with getting the key
activated/Reactivated. The technician I talked to kept telling me I needed
to reinstall ultimate and that Microsoft needs to give me a new ultimate
product key. You cannot use a premium key with ultimate. I’ve been waiting
now for almost 10 hours for a call back when I raised the problem to the
supervisor’s level.
8.While I was waiting for HP to call me, Microsoft support called me to ask
if my problem has been resolved. I told them no but I was waiting for HP to
call me. They told me if I was not getting any satisfaction with HP to call
them back and they would see what they could do to resolve the issue.
9.After 6 hours of waiting I decided to call Microsoft back, they stepped me
through the process of resetting the product key using a 45 digit code
number. Then they activated my existing Premium product key but now as an
ultimate key. Obviously the tech people at HP don’t know what they’re
talking about.
10.Everything is now working fine, what a day! Thank you Microsoft support.
Mark
PS: I used Vista voice recognition softeware to type this.
