To
tell you the truth, I have never understood what the big deal is with
product activation. The fact of the matter is that software piracy is
fairly rampant and that Microsoft is the target for a large percentage
of the piracy due to their dominance in the operating system and office
productivity software markets. They have a right to try to stop or at
least control that privacy and the product activation seems to be a
fair way of ensuring that only legitimate software owners get to
benefit from using it.
All that said, I know that there are many users who abhor the
process. It may be because they have had problems activating and have
had to call the toll-free number and wait to talk to a Microsoft
support agent who then read them some 278-character long (okay- it's a
slight exaggeration) activation code.
Or maybe they just feel that it is some sort of invasion of
privacy or that Microsoft is acting as "Big Brother" and monitoring
their actions.
No matter the reason, there are plenty of users who would rather never
go through the product activation process again. Unfortunately for
those users, they may very well run into a situation where they do.
Product activation monitors the system configuration. If it detects a
major hardware change or even too many minor hardware changes within a
set number of days (I believe it's 180 days before it resets) then it
crosses the threshold and requires reactivation.
Users who reformat their hard drive and perform a clean
installation of the operating system will find that they need to
reactivate the product. But, as long as the new installation is on the
same system and there won't be any hardware changes it is possible to
transfer the existing product activation and skip having to go through
the product activation process again. Follow the steps below to save
the activation status information and restore it once your system is
rebuilt:
- Double-click My Computer
- Double-click on the "C" drive
- Go to the C:\Windows\System32 folder (you may have to click on the link that says "Show The contents of this folder")
- Find the files "wpa.dbl" and "wpa.bak" and copy them to a safe
location. You can copy them on a floppy drive or burn it onto a CD or
DVD.
- After you have reinstalled Windows XP on your reformatted
hard drive, click "No" when asked if you want to go ahead and go
through the activation process
- Reboot your computer into SafeMode (you can either press F8
as Windows is booting up to see the Windows Advanced Options menu and
select SAFEBOOT_OPTION=Minimal or follow the instructions in Starting Windows XP in SafeMode
- Double-click My Computer
- Double-click on the "C" drive
- Go to the C:\Windows\System32 folder (you may have to click on the link that says "Show The contents of this folder")
- Find the file "wpa.dbl" and "wpa.bak" (if it exists) and rename them to "wpadbl.new" and "wpabak.new"
- Copy your original "wpa.dbl" and "wpa.bak" files from your floppy disk, CD or DVD into the C:\Windows\System32 folder
- Restart your system (if you followed the directions in Starting Windows XP in SafeMode you may need to go back into MSCONFIG to turn off booting into SafeMode)
Voila! Your Windows XP operating system is now reinstalled on your
reformatted hard drive and you are all activated without having to
actually go through the product activation process!
Remember though. This won't work for transferring activation
information from one computer to another or if you alter the hardware
because the information contained in your "wpa.dbl" file will not match
the configuration of the computer. This trick is only for reinstalling
Windows XP on the exact same computer after formatting the hard drive.
