Find out product key for XP after activating Windows 7 upgrade

M

moogle301

New Member
Hi, I have tried googling this and there is info out there but my case is quite specific and it's hard to find an answer for it, yet I think a lot of people on this forum will know the answer.

Basically I got this computer from a friend who I unfortunately now don't really speak to and don't really wish to. At that time it came with XP which possibly was a Uni license (or something, I'm not 100% sure, I seem to remember this being mentioned but he might have been talking about the software instead, I forget).

I bought a Windows 7 upgrade and used it.

I'm bought a SSD and am planning on cloning to that but I'm just wondering if something goes wrong, or really just in general if/when my HDD or future SDD drive fails if I will be stuck.

I don't think I have the product key for the XP. I see there are software tools out there to find out the product key of the OS you're running, but will these just give me the results for my Windows 7 upgrade? :|

Also, if I do find out the XP key and put the OS on the SSD before wiping the HDD, will it activate again? I know you can't have the license in use on multiple computers at once but I'm not really sure how it knows whether it's in use, is it because I'll be using the same motherboard?

Finally, if this screws up, can I use my windows 7 activation on my ollllllddd xp computer or is it tied to this version of XP now?

Thanks for any help.
 
Is there a way to add tags? I pressed enter to add the first tag (by mistake, as this is how tabs work on some sites) and it submitted the thread...
 
tremmor said:
to the first question there should be a sticker from microsoft for your xp key on the bottom of the laptop. If your installing 7 you better make sure and get all the drivers for your laptop model.

Want to read the first answer here at Microsoft.
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...y/e9a36c30-88d8-41dc-a940-74ccf13bd2e0?auth=1
Click to expand...

It isn't a laptop it's a very heavy PC, but I can try and get someone to help me lift it and check it that's where it'd be on a desktop PC? I think he built it himself do idk if it would have a sticker.
 
If he built it himself I doubt you will find a sticker on the case.
It also sounds like he got a student edition XP.
If your worried just make a restore disc set.
 
You don't really need the XP key if what you want to do is be able to re-install the Win 7 upgrade. You can do a clean install of Win 7 using the upgrade media. Since you used the XP license to upgrade the computer to Win 7, legally, you have relinquished that key and now only have a license for Win 7.
 
strollin said:
You don't really need the XP key if what you want to do is be able to re-install the Win 7 upgrade. You can do a clean install of Win 7 using the upgrade media. Since you used the XP license to upgrade the computer to Win 7, legally, you have relinquished that key and now only have a license for Win 7.
Click to expand...

Aha thanks :) I hope this is true because w7 is the one I have the details for and bought myself, it makes things simpler. :)

Yeah I think I'm going to clone rather than install from scratch onto my SSD I was just worried that if that dies or if this goes wrong I'd be stuck with a useless w7 upgrade disc.

Do you have any links to where you got the info or is it just something you know from doing it?

I actually lost my w7 disc and the download window expired but I think when upgrading it I found a legal w7 download and used my key, (because any w7 disc/download works provided the key is ok?) so hopefully could just do that again.

I just didn't know if it would be bad to phone up microsoft (which I've not done before) and be like "I own w7 upgrade but technically I wasn't the original user of the XP PC" because I don't know how things like that work legally.

Thanks for you reply :)
 
MyCattMaxx said:
If he built it himself I doubt you will find a sticker on the case.
It also sounds like he got a student edition XP.
If your worried just make a restore disc set.
Click to expand...

Hi, thanks for replying. Would you recommend making a recover disc or using acronis/clonezilla to make a disc image? I'm just googling both of those now to learn more but in case you have any insight. :)

Ps. He works at a Uni so idk if it's a student version, might be something where uni's buy a license for lots of machines or something, idk. :S
 
johnb35 said:
You really don't want to clone from HDD to SDD anyway. You will get your best performance doing a clean install on an SSD. You might want to look through this guide to properly setup the SSD and install.

http://www.computerforum.com/192436-setup-manage-ssd.html
Click to expand...

Oh ok, here it says "A casual Google search will reveal that geeks across the web are deeply divided about whether or not you should copy an existing installation or start with a fresh installation of Windows. There’s very little conclusive evidence that cloning your existing HDD onto an SSD causes any issues and certainly not enough evidence for you to kill an entire day (or even a weekend or longer) installing everything from scratch and tweaking all your applications and settings. Your time is valuable, far too valuable to waste redoing all your work chasing a phantom increase in performance. At the How-To Geek office we’ve been using the a cloned SSD for some time with no ill effect (and none of the headaches that come with wiping your system and starting from scratch). Migrating is an enormous time saver."

None of the 'find your product key' type softwares are giving me anything :( so I don't know if I can ever install w7 again. I'll have to do this disc image thing I think? :|
 
moogle301 said:
... None of the 'find your product key' type softwares are giving me anything :( so I don't know if I can ever install w7 again. I'll have to do this disc image thing I think? :|
Click to expand...
Really? Did you try this one? Keyfinder.

I have this on my Win 7 machine and it can find my Win 7 CD key as well as the keys for Office 2007 & 2010.

Didn't you keep the Key you were given when you purchased the upgrade?

As far as cloning vs reinstalling, the only issue I know of with cloning is that of partition alignment. Cloning doesn't assure the partition will be aligned on the correct boundary and ssd performance may suffer. Read about it here: http://lifehacker.com/5837769/make-sure-your-partitions-are-correctly-aligned-for-optimal-solid-state-drive-performance
 
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strollin said:
Really? Did you try this one? Keyfinder.

I have this on my Win 7 machine and it can find my Win 7 CD key as well as the keys for Office 2007 & 2010.

Didn't you keep the Key you were given when you purchased the upgrade?

As far as cloning vs reinstalling, the only issue I know of with cloning is that of partition alignment. Cloning doesn't assure the partition will be aligned on the correct boundary and ssd performance may suffer. Read about it here: http://lifehacker.com/5837769/make-sure-your-partitions-are-correctly-aligned-for-optimal-solid-state-drive-performance
Click to expand...

I never had the key. It's my XP key that I'm worried about. :| It was already installed when I got the computer from somebody I know. I don't think I needed it when I upgraded to w7. I'm pretty sure I still know my w7 key but I'd need the XP one as well for a clean install?

And yeah, it gave me my office keys but I couldn't see anything for the OS. I tried two programs but not that particular one.

I wouldn't mind just cloning except I've been having problems with my computer turning on from sleep at either 2.20 or 2.45am to hibernate (loudly) or just turn on generally. I thought I'd turned this off months ago so not sure why it's started and when I type in the cmd as to what turned it on it doesn't display it. So idk if clean install would solve this. It's a whole other problem really. :| If only I weren't a light sleeper but it happens, I wake up and look at the clock and sure enough. I've been up since 2.45am today because of it. :(
 
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Try Magic Jelly Bean, like he linked. It really is magic.

And you can download and install the windows 7 .ISOs straight from microsoft. They can be found here.

And you do not need the XP one anymore.
 
claptonman said:
Try Magic Jelly Bean, like he linked. It really is magic.

And you can download and install the windows 7 .ISOs straight from microsoft. They can be found here.

And you do not need the XP one anymore.
Click to expand...

Hi thanks, I will try the jelly bean one soon. :)

If I am doing a fresh install using an upgrade version of Windows 7 won't I still need an XP key or since it is already 'tied' to my windows 7 key will it skip that part? I did my previous upgrade myself but this sounds trickier because my situation isn't really mentioned in the guides I have found. Also I wonder is my key will work with the 64-bit iso because that would be nice but I think it asked me to pick one or the other when I bought it years ago and I picked 32-bit..
 
Just perform a clean install using the upgrade DVD. There are guides online on how to do this. Plain and simple....
 
moogle301 said:
Hi thanks, I will try the jelly bean one soon. :)

If I am doing a fresh install using an upgrade version of Windows 7 won't I still need an XP key or since it is already 'tied' to my windows 7 key will it skip that part? I did my previous upgrade myself but this sounds trickier because my situation isn't really mentioned in the guides I have found. Also I wonder is my key will work with the 64-bit iso because that would be nice but I think it asked me to pick one or the other when I bought it years ago and I picked 32-bit..
Click to expand...

The key can be used on either 64-bit or 32-bit.

You do not need the key if doing a fresh install. You will be deleting XP when doing that.
 
Your Win 7 upgrade is not physically tied to your Win XP license, only legally tied. You will not be asked for the XP product key to reinstall Win 7.

Look back in this thread to where I posted a link to how to do a clean install of Win 7 using upgrade media.
 
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