W P A

  • Thread starter Thread starter Steve.UK
  • Start date Start date
S

Steve.UK

i read somewhere (but i can't find it now) that when performing a clean
install of XP, saving your WPA.bak and WPA.dbl files to a floppy before you
start and then copying them back into the windows sys32 folder will save you
having to re-activate windows (as long as your hardware hasn't changed).

i have tried it but it hasn't worked. has anyone any knowledge of this?


thanks.
 
"Contrary to what many journalists and members of the
user community have written in recent months, restoring
these files (WPA) will not restore your activation status following
a reformat and clean install."

Ref: http://aumha.org/win5/a/wpa.htm (Hint #3)

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

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

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


| i read somewhere (but i can't find it now) that when performing a clean
| install of XP, saving your WPA.bak and WPA.dbl files to a floppy before you
| start and then copying them back into the windows sys32 folder will save you
| having to re-activate windows (as long as your hardware hasn't changed).
|
| i have tried it but it hasn't worked. has anyone any knowledge of this?
|
|
| thanks.
 
I think the trick is *not* to reformat. Reformatting wipes the code that wpa
expects to find and replaced it with another one. Thus when you copy the wpa
files back the numbers don't add up. By not reformatting the 'drive'
allocation number remains the same. Also if you take a look at the wpa file
dates they are something like 30/12/1698
 
Steve;
This link explains why is does not work after a format and when and
why it will work:
http://aumha.org/win5/a/wpa.htm

Also, how much time do you expect to save by saving them?
If you have made no hardware changes, activation takes second, not
even enough time to install and remove the floppy disk you made.
Worst case is a 5 minute call to Microsoft.
 
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