Vista Reactivation? DeathAbyss 7/4/2007 7:58:00 PM A message popped up telling me there was a hardware change and i had to reactivate the product key. When i tried to reactivate, a message came up telling me the product key was already in use and i needed to purchase another one. I had made no hardware changes, nor did i install any new programs that can be counted as hardware changes. How do i reactivate my vista without buying a new product key?

Re: Vista Reactivation? "Andrew McLaren" <andrew[ at ]fakeaddress.com> 7/4/2007 8:21:18 PM "DeathAbyss" <DeathAbyss[ at ]discussions.microsoft.com> wrote ... [Quoted Text] >A message popped up telling me there was a hardware change and i had to > reactivate the product key. When i tried to reactivate, a message came up > telling me the product key was already in use and i needed to purchase > another one. The message should have given you a Microsoft phone number to ring. There are different numbers for different countries. You just ring the number and ask for an activation code. They give you a number, you plug it in to Windows, and you're activated. Takes about 3 minutes. The algorithm in Vista which detects hardware changes is pretty complex and a bit unpredictable at times. It can interpret extremely subtle changes, such as a change in your BIOS, as though you had installed Vista on a new machine. It's wrong, of course. But just get a new activation code over the phone. Hopefully the algorithm will be a bit smarter in the next Service Pack. Hope it helps Andrew

Re: Vista Reactivation? "Ronnie Vernon MVP" <rv[ at ]invalid.org> 7/4/2007 9:40:58 PM I don't have any idea why the reaction would occur if you have not made any hardware changes? This can be solved easily though. See the following website for a description of the issue and how to fix it. Product Key Already In Use When Attempting To Activate Windows Vista: http://vistasupport.mvps.org/product_key_already_in_use.htm -- Ronnie Vernon Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User "DeathAbyss" <DeathAbyss[ at ]discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message news:79462DA7-0403-4ECA-A006-B4DDD70719A1[ at ]microsoft.com... [Quoted Text] >A message popped up telling me there was a hardware change and i had to > reactivate the product key. When i tried to reactivate, a message came up > telling me the product key was already in use and i needed to purchase > another one. > I had made no hardware changes, nor did i install any new programs that > can > be counted as hardware changes. > How do i reactivate my vista without buying a new product key?