XP activation

  • Thread starter Thread starter Roger Neilson
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Roger Neilson

the continuance of a long and involved problem...hopefully now solved.

I won't go into details but my son, living in another part of the
country 'needed' to install XP to allow a peripheral to run. The
install completely screwed up his internet and he then found he didn't
actually 'need' XP to run the peripheral after all. He therefore has a
copy of XP which he has installed once and has now uninstalled and
gone back to Me...his choice not mine. As he has not actually
activated XP what is its status in terms of what he can do with it?
Can he return it to the shop (unlikely) or sell it as an unactivated
copy? He otherwise is stuck with an O/S he won't use at all.

I emphasise it is a legitimate bought version from PC World, and he
has not activated it.

Thanks for any advice for him.

Roger
 
Roger;
Return it to the store if possible.
Otherwise if it is retail and less than 30 days old in North America,
return directly to Microsoft:
http://www.microsoft.com/info/nareturns.htm

Since it was not activated and will be removed from the computer, he
is free to sell it under the same terms he bought it.
 
Roger Neilson said:
the continuance of a long and involved problem...hopefully now solved.

I won't go into details but my son, living in another part of the
country 'needed' to install XP to allow a peripheral to run. The
install completely screwed up his internet and he then found he didn't
actually 'need' XP to run the peripheral after all. He therefore has a
copy of XP which he has installed once and has now uninstalled and
gone back to Me...his choice not mine. As he has not actually
activated XP what is its status in terms of what he can do with it?
Can he return it to the shop (unlikely) or sell it as an unactivated
copy? He otherwise is stuck with an O/S he won't use at all.

I emphasise it is a legitimate bought version from PC World, and he
has not activated it.

Thanks for any advice for him.

Roger
Click to expand...

I doubt the store would take it back, simply because they would have no way
of knowing whether a customer had copied the CD and written down the CD Key
and/or activated the software. If they took it back, they could end up
selling software that was already being used, and then they'd be getting
grief for that when the second customer tried to activate and found out that
the number was already being used multiple times.

However, he should have no problem selling it to someone else.
 
Roger Neilson said:
the continuance of a long and involved problem...hopefully now solved.

I won't go into details but my son, living in another part of the
country 'needed' to install XP to allow a peripheral to run. The
install completely screwed up his internet and he then found he didn't
actually 'need' XP to run the peripheral after all. He therefore has a
copy of XP which he has installed once and has now uninstalled and
gone back to Me...his choice not mine. As he has not actually
activated XP what is its status in terms of what he can do with it?
Can he return it to the shop (unlikely) or sell it as an unactivated
copy? He otherwise is stuck with an O/S he won't use at all.

I emphasise it is a legitimate bought version from PC World, and he
has not activated it.

Thanks for any advice for him.

Roger
Click to expand...

A retail copy of Windows XP is licensed to the purchaser and may be
legitimately sold or transferred to another person *provided* that the
copy is no longer installed on a computer.

If he sells it he should give the purchaser a letter confirming that:
a: he was the original purchaser of the copy, identifying the store
and date of purchase.
b: the copy has been completely removed from the computer that it was
installed on, and that computer is now running a different version of
Windows.

Good luck


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

"The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much."
 
Roger said:
I won't go into details but my son, living in another part of the
country 'needed' to install XP to allow a peripheral to run. The
install completely screwed up his internet and he then found he didn't
actually 'need' XP to run the peripheral after all. He therefore has a
copy of XP which he has installed once and has now uninstalled and
gone back to Me...his choice not mine. As he has not actually
activated XP what is its status in terms of what he can do with it?
Click to expand...

It is effectively unused. I very much doubt if the shop would take it
back if opened - but he can sell it on, provided he transfers the CD,
documents, Certificate of authenticity and Product Key. If I were
buying I would require a written certificate that it had never been
activated
 
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