How do you install Windows MCE?

Hayley-K · 19 Apr 2007 at 11:14

I know this may sound a little silly but i've only ever installed xp pro and that has the 1 cd. I need to put media center on my neighbours laptop as i think a fresh install will sort out their problem yet if they need to take it back to the shop i want the original OS on there and I dont want to mess it up.

From what i gather so long as you put in a MCE cd key it should install properly and ask for the second CD, is this right??

Any help would be much appreciated

Thanks

Hayley

david334 · 19 Apr 2007 at 11:19

did you get MCE from tony williams

Haha! he is the MCE boy

Tony Williams · 19 Apr 2007 at 11:24

Hayley-K said:
I know this may sound a little silly but i've only ever installed xp pro and that has the 1 cd. I need to put media center on my neighbours laptop as i think a fresh install will sort out their problem yet if they need to take it back to the shop i want the original OS on there and I dont want to mess it up.

From what i gather so long as you put in a MCE cd key it should install properly and ask for the second CD, is this right??

Any help would be much appreciated

Thanks

Hayley

Yes the install process is similer to the other XP's. MCE does however use two discs so once it's setting up you'll need to swap and change the discs once you're in XP after that it's about the same as the other XP's with the extra features.

david334 said:
did you get MCE from tony williams Haha! he is the MCE boy

Hayley-K · 19 Apr 2007 at 12:42

david334 said:
did you get MCE from tony williams Haha! he is the MCE boy

Lol ok cool thanks, i will do that this afternoon, just didn't want to mess anything up.

michael baxter · 19 Apr 2007 at 12:50

As above, install as any other XP.

However, you must ensure you install the following as well:

MCE compatible graphics driver
MCE compatible DVD decoder
MCE compatible TV decoder driver

But, if it came preinstalled, I guess you will have those components at hand.

Hayley-K · 19 Apr 2007 at 16:49

no lol my neighbours lost everything that came with it but i managed to track down the drivers took me a while tho!

Hayley-K · 19 Apr 2007 at 17:03

i have a major problem the mce key with the laptop doesnt work :confused:

and it seems to have installed pro with the first cd is this right?

michael baxter · 19 Apr 2007 at 19:15

Hayley-K said:
i have a major problem the mce key with the laptop doesnt work and it seems to have installed pro with the first cd is this right?

That's frustrating!

Are you sure the key you have is for MCE? You sure the laptop was installed with MCE from new? If so, there shouldn't be any problems during the install process.

Does the installer say the key is invalid?

Fothsn · 20 Apr 2007 at 09:45

IIR correctly when you come to install MCE and use a none MCE key I.E XP Pro it will only install the core OS which is in fact Pro, you need a valid MCE key.

Which doesn’t look like you have, also may be worth to do a full format if not already this may solve the problem.

csmager · 20 Apr 2007 at 10:30

MCE 2005 was an OEM-Only OS. It was XP Pro with MCE bolted on and some of the logos changed.

As a result, they didn't bother rebranding the CD - so the first disc will indeed say that it is XP Professional (and ask for XP Professional Discs 1 and 2 when required). You must use MCE discs - not an XP Pro disc (this won't prompt for another disc). There is a file on Disc 1 that tells it which files are on Disc 2.

To my knowledge, it won't accept XP Pro keys.

What you are probably experiencing is that the laptop has an OEM key that is tied to a particular manufacturer - as a result, only CDs from this manufacturer will accept the key on the laptop. Your generic ones will not.

Hayley-K · 20 Apr 2007 at 17:21

csmager said:
MCE 2005 was an OEM-Only OS. It was XP Pro with MCE bolted on and some of the logos changed.

As a result, they didn't bother rebranding the CD - so the first disc will indeed say that it is XP Professional (and ask for XP Professional Discs 1 and 2 when required). You must use MCE discs - not an XP Pro disc (this won't prompt for another disc). There is a file on Disc 1 that tells it which files are on Disc 2.

To my knowledge, it won't accept XP Pro keys.

What you are probably experiencing is that the laptop has an OEM key that is tied to a particular manufacturer - as a result, only CDs from this manufacturer will accept the key on the laptop. Your generic ones will not.

Right Ok well I've put pro on there for now and i think all the problems are sorted with the machine so fingers crossed it wont need to go in for a repair and they never used the media centre application anyway.

I did think that it could have been an OEM key but it a bit frustrating when they dont supply you with any disks if you want to re-install and the recovery disk I created was absolute rubbish!!