hi
im new to this site but have been reading through the posts and it seems you lot know what you are talking about so im hoping someone will be able to help me.
i bought my sons laptop from him and need to delete everything of his off there, he has xp professional on it but no disc or recovery disc so i would also like to install my own xp on it.
i hope this makes sense!! and all help will be greatly appreciated
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General discussion
bought second hand laptop
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If there are three legal copies of Windows XP involved here:
1. the one you own
2. the one on the computer you bought
3. the one on your son's new computer
DO NOT format and delete the product key on the laptop you bought before you get the legal Windows XP product key from the hard disk. There are many ways to do this. One is to use Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder.
If your son has kept the laptop's licensed Windows XP disks for his own use, then format away!!!
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thanks for replying so quickly, ill bear in mind what you said linkit, my son cant find the discs i think he lost them when he moved to be honest, so i have only my own legal xp, so i will certainly find the key thingy as you suggested,
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If you have a Windows XP CD with a valid product key and the laptop that you purchased from your son has XP installed with a different product key, then you now own two legal copies of Windows XP!!! Yee-haw!!!
The product key, in a way, is more important than the original Windows XP CD. If you lose the CD and you have a valid product key, you still can install Windows. If have a Windows XP CD and lose the valid product key, you pretty much are out of luck and have to purchase a new copy.
I just wanted to make sure that you don't lose a valid XP product key that someone had already purchased at one time.
Good luck!
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The link Stan provides offers that when working with a laptop expect extra hassles due to drivers and the like. These drivers are usually unique/propiertory and best served by the vendor support website. Know your laptop model# and proceed to said website and get the proper drivers as XP CD alone won't necessarily be 100% provide all that, just know that. Further, its possible if the laptop was sold with XP pre-installed, go again to the support website and you can usually order the recovery CDs, etc. at greatly reduced cost, worth the effort. All too often laptop recovery is a tedious process even with proper CDs and as XP can be troublesome at times, best to have the actual CDs and/or end-user done CDs near by.
tada -----Willy 
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