Given the following circumstances, how does one correct the problem?
A friend of mine had a virus that toasted his boot files. (XP Home HP edition – =OEM version, out of warranty naturally.) I would like to repair the installation. Restoring from the restore partition is going to hose his data and programs as well so this is not really a good option. I know that your can repair an installation over top of the current installation if you run the installation from an install CD and tell it to repair the ‘found’ installation. Here’s the rub… I have a Retail XP home CD when I need an OEM version of the CD so I can reuse his original license key. HPs’ solution was to buy a new imaged Hard Drive from HP to the tune of $140.00. Not Good. Where does one get an OEM install CD or iso? Is there anything illegal about what I am trying to do? Shouldn’t be as far as I can tell…
TIA
David
