Re-use Vista Home Premium install disk

E

evereti

New Member
Hi Guys

I have used a Vista Home Premium Upgrade disk to do a clean instal on my HP DC5100 XP machine. Everything installed great and Vista runs very well:grinning:, EXCEPT, for Aero and Glass, DVD Maker, etc.>.<

Turns out there is no way I can get a suitable video card to run in this PC to run full Vista Home Premium. Too bad but I still like Vista.

So

I could blow away this new installation and get a cheap Vista Home Basic which will give me what I have now and instal this on the DC5100.

The question then is, will I hit problems when I try to reuse the Home Premium Upgrade disk on another PC. I have a laptop with Home Basic on which I could do an upgrade rather than clean instal. This will get one of my machines to Premium.

I am sure the disk will work OK, but not sure if activation will fall over due the fact that its an upgrade disk that's been activated once already.

Thanks for your help

evereti
 
As long as it's a retail version (full price) not a cheap OEM system-builder DVD, you can use it on as many different hardware configurations as you like serially, not concurrently.
i.e. as long as only one PC at a time contains a copy of Windows with that serial number, you are complying with the EULA.
You might need to activate by phone (free number) rather than online, but that's a mere formality. Just say you're moving the OS to new hardware.
Because it's an upgrade, not a full retail version, both the old and new systems will need a previous qualifying version of Windows already installed, or will require you to mount an old Windows CD during the install if you opt for a clean install, for proof of eligibility.
When they give you an activation code for the new install, the previous install becomes "non-genuine" (pirate) and any attempt to use WIndows Update to keep it in-use and up-to-date, will fail the Genuine Windows validation checks.
 
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