[Xeon]

Hiya

Im plannning on replacing all of my original hardware with new parts such as motherboard and processor etc. Except for my SATA Hard disk drive.

If i do this will my operating system need to be re-activated to tell microsoft about the changes or will it automatically detect the changes so i can install the new hardware.

My Operating system is Windows xp professional. Any help would be much appreciated. Thanx

[alex]

Hi Xeon.

Bottom line is that your build has to score enough points for XP to activate on the new build. Each component scores a differing amount of points; for instance, your motherboard might score 10 and the optical might score 1.

But as you're changing out pretty much the whole build the above is academic.

I'd say try it, never know, but I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't. (If you didn't activate your copy of XP it will regardless of hardware changes).

On the upside Microsoft have been rather lenient regarding upgraders and usually, if you can provide a valid key, they'll give you another as a one off. But I am hearing rumours on the net that since Vista's release they're stopping this to try to force people to purchase the new o.s. But as with any rumour this may have no foundation whatsoever.