[braddersep]

I am planning to buy an OEM version of Windows XP following my recent posts about reinstalling XP. I read that Microsoft have disabled internet activation of the product keys and that you have to phone them to get activation. Is this true for all OEM versions?.

[spot]

Not the last time I did it. If you post a link to a believable report then we'll have a better idea.

What they've done in the past is issued a series of XP versions for which different keys were valid. A key for one CD wouldn't activate a different CD XP series even though it was a valid XP key. For those a phone call's the only way to get activated. That could be where the impression arose.

[braddersep]

I read it on the www.michaelstevenstech.com website under Windows XP FAQ.(question17).

[spot]

"As of February 28th 2005, all COA keys affixed to the computer case will have internet activation disabled"?

He's plain wrong then. I must have internet-activated at least a hundred XP's I re-installed from scratch using their COA key from the computer case in the last two years.

[redden137]

Ive read it and i had no problems installing my xp and activating it over the net, back in early 07 think what this article is about the large scale pirating of the corporate edition of xp( because it was a multi licence and allowed thousands of bent o/s) and so to stop this only registered companies could register with it microsoft, hence the questions by phone small builders and single coa licences where left unaffected as the license coa was for one use only