windows activation

I dunno, I think it would be ebst to phone them. Don't they just dive you a new CD key to activate it with when you call 'em?

I have swapped out quite a few devices and never had to reactivate. It really isn't a big deal anyways. Quite painless. I did have to call them up once after I reformatted and activated my comp more than a few times in a few months. They simply gave me a new key. No explanation...no pain..minimal hold time.

yea i know it's simple to phone em & they're supposed to be easy to work with i just find it odd that adding an external audio soundcard & (possibly) swapping a processor for the same processor type/model would be enought to trigger re activation is all (specially since i'm pretty sure the cpu wasn't switched)

I've had to reactivate about 5 times after swapping out various parts. Most recently my comp was damaged when I shipped it to the US when I moved, and had to replace the motherboard and CPU. Yet another reactivation. The other day I upgraded by Nvidia drivers from v75 to v81 and on the reboot windows said something like "a number of changes have occurred and you need to reactivate". Sheesh. Upgrading video drivers is all I did! As mentioned already though, it's a painless process and the last time it was automatic (by the internet). For the mobo change though it said I had done too many reactivations and I needed to call the activation center. That too was painless and was all done talking too a computer. I only once had to speak to some pleasant lady at 3am :-)

btw. Here's a cool set of tweaks for XP, and in there is one that explains how to avoid reactivation after a reinstall.

F451

MS said that once winxp becomes irrelevant in business sense that they might stop requiring activation of the os. I hope when vista ships that this will become true. I don't have the exact link but it's somewhere on MS winxp faq website along with detailed activation faq. Worth the look imo.