Kept a hard copy of Fred Langa’s 2006 article “XP’s No-Format, Nondestructive Total-Rebuild Option”. Just so happens that now a friend of mine wants help with his older laptop that runs XP. Sounds like Fred’s rebuild idea would be perfect for this machine. He wants to keep it as a “spare” & has been having some issues with it. One question I have. He’s pretty sure XP was pre-loaded on this Toshiba machine, if there was a separate partition with a copy of XP on it, it is not there now. I have a cd of XP from one of my previously built machines. Can I use that to do the repair build? If so, which product ID # would I use, the one that is on his machine now or the one that is on my XP cd?
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XP total-rebuild option
Home » Forums » AskWoody support » Windows » Windows Vista, XP and earlier » Questions: Vista, XP back to 3.1 » XP total-rebuild option
- This topic has 8 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated 10 years, 11 months ago.
AuthorTopicWSdaherbst
AskWoody LoungerApril 22, 2014 at 12:41 pm #494419Viewing 5 reply threadsAuthorReplies-
WSPrescott
AskWoody LoungerApril 22, 2014 at 12:57 pm #1449951If both CDs are the same version of XP, probably Home Premium, and you are doing the non-destructive rebuild, then I think you can.
If you were doing a clean install, then the OEM Product Key wouldn’t work with the Retail CD (or with an OEM XP CD from another manufacturer, or in the case of HP even from a different model).
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WSjpdemers
AskWoody LoungerApril 24, 2014 at 7:24 am #1450187For folks who don’t have it / can’t find it, Fred’s original article is here:
http://www.informationweek.com/software/operating-systems/langa-letter-xps-no-reformat-nondestructive-total-rebuild-option/d/d-id/1044226 -
William G Travis
AskWoody Plus -
William G Travis
AskWoody PlusMay 24, 2014 at 8:28 am #1454384The 6 year computer which I performed CPR on, still had the CD’s that came with it & the key code, with SP 2 in it, and it installed. Then I did a fresh install using W 7, Home premium, and a new key code. it took took no time to install. What took the time was in stalling 150+ updates. P.S. Jelly Bean will give u a key code.
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Joe S
AskWoody LoungerMay 23, 2014 at 10:46 pm #1454311Something you may encounter is the install disk you are using for repair needs to be fairly close with the MS updates or it it will fault. That’s how I learned about slipstreaming years ago. You use Nlite and update packs I don’t see any of the old places that kept up with the new releases from MS.
Joe -
tonyl
AskWoody LoungerMay 24, 2014 at 4:47 am #1454374Something you may encounter is the install disk you are using for repair needs to be fairly close with the MS updates or it it will fault. That’s how I learned about slipstreaming years ago. You use Nlite and update packs I don’t see any of the old places that kept up with the new releases from MS.
Joe -
Joe S
AskWoody LoungerMay 24, 2014 at 4:05 pm #1454434It took a while to find this but if you do not want the hassle of reactivation for XP there are 2 files you copy before the install. Go to the C:WindowsSystem32 then copy “wpa.dbl” and “wpa.bak” and save for after install. After new install go in safe mode and copy them to C:WindowsSystem32 I just renamed the 2 existing files. It will not work if the hardware is significantly different from that in place when the Windows Product Activation database files were created.
Joe -
WSPrescott
AskWoody LoungerMay 24, 2014 at 4:36 pm #1454435It took a while to find this but if you do not want the hassle of reactivation for XP there are 2 files you copy before the install. Go to the C:WindowsSystem32 then copy “wpa.dbl” and “wpa.bak” and save for after install. After new install go in safe mode and copy them to C:WindowsSystem32 I just renamed the 2 existing files. It will not work if the hardware is significantly different from that in place when the Windows Product Activation database files were created.
JoeA very useful piece of information. I wish I knew this 15 years ago.
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