Another Windows CD key recovery question… :P

My sisters hard drive recently failed on her old IBM thinkpad (circa PII). I have been able to pull SOME data off the drive but cannot get it to boot in any way, shape, or form.

I’m kind of afraid to ask this, as I think I already know the answer… but here it goes anyways.

Is there any way to recover the CD key off this hard drive? My sister got it from a pawnshop and it had XP on it then. I wasn’t around to oversee the purchase, and it wasn’t until AFTER the drive failed that I found out there wasn’t a XP CD Key sticker on the laptop.

I would try to use some kind of keyfinder but those will only work in the copy of windows is bootable.

So, any suggestions anyone?

Thanks in advance!

– Midashand