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Can OEM OSes be transferred from one HDD to another?

By jhockstok ·
I have two scenarios that pertain to the topic in question.

1.) If my hard drive fails, can I use a WinXP disk and my installion key (that I've previously made record of) without violating the EULA?

2.) If a working drive is nearing capacity, can I somehow deactivate the first installation of WinXP and install that OS (and Office software) on a bigger hard drive?

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Well

by Kenone In reply to Can OEM OSes be transferr ...

1 yes, if you change too many hardware vectors you might have a problem and have to contact MS.
2 No, it's not that easy. Either add a larger capacity drive for data storage as an additional drive (D:) or follow the same process as if the original drive had failed.

Pedicated on your having the original OEM OS disk. If you just have a retail OS disk then the license key that came with that should be used not the OEM license.

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Yes and Yes

by robo_dev In reply to Can OEM OSes be transferr ...

1) yes, you're only running the OS on one PC, and the license is for that PC.

2) You don't really 'deactivate' the OS license, you just stop using it.

Technically it's OK to have a cloned hard drive with the OS on it, sitting on a shelf as a backup. As long as that hard drive is not used in another PC.

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Is this a theoretical query or do you actually want to do this?

by dldorrance In reply to Can OEM OSes be transferr ...

If the latter give us your specific situation. Is this a laptop or desktop; if a desktop can you add a second, larger HDD to the computer? If a laptop, can you remove the existing HDD? Do you wish to save your programs and data, or just start with a fresh version of Windows? Do you have cloning software?

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