It's maddening when you realise you've lost the registration key to an expensive piece of software. It's happened to me twice in the last week. First I uninstalled Microsoft Office 2007, before realising that it came preinstalled without any media. Then someone gave me an Acer netbook with a faulty hdd to fix. The registration sticker was on the underside, but to my horror, one letter was missing where the sticker had worn. It would be nice if there was some way of retrieving these keys, because losing one is like losing the thing itself.
Lost Microsoft Software Registration Keys
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Thanks for the link. I will give Magic Jelly Bean a try, but it's not clear from the article whether registration keys persist after software is uninstalled. If the software is still installed, finding the registration key is usually as simple as checking the help / about menu option, which doesn't need third party software to find.
One of the best best explanations I've ever received. Too bad I read it after using the Magical Jelly Bean, which found the keys.
I never previously associated software keys with the Windows registry. Seems obvious now.
No doubt there's plenty that Magical Jelly Bean can't find, because they're using it to plug a more capable premium product.
Thanks all round.
I never previously associated software keys with the Windows registry. Seems obvious now.
No doubt there's plenty that Magical Jelly Bean can't find, because they're using it to plug a more capable premium product.
Thanks all round.
Too bad I read this after ripping open the netbook with the faulty hdd.
Reinstalling Windows 7 on a netbook
I was able to guess the single character missing from the torn Windows registration key sticker. After all, it could only be one of 36 possibilities, ie. a-z and 0-9. It saved me from having to retrieve the key from an unbootable hard disc.
It seems most netbooks don't ship with the operating system on a DVD and you can't download the Windows 7 Starter Edition that is common on them. Windows registration keys are specific to particular editions of the operating system, so you can't just use another Windows 7 DVD to install from. Fortunately, you can create your own bootable Windows 7 Starter Edition DVD or USB drive.
You can do this by downloading another edition of Windows from the links on the Dell support site, which is also where I found the solution.
Simply edit a file called ei.cfg in the sources folder. So, if you download Windows 7 "Ultimate", you can relabel it in the ei.cfg file to "Starter".
I should point out that the Novacorp WinToFlash software Dell recommend for burning Windows to bootable discs seems to be bloatware, no matter which site you download it from. I recommend ImgBurn instead.
I was able to guess the single character missing from the torn Windows registration key sticker. After all, it could only be one of 36 possibilities, ie. a-z and 0-9. It saved me from having to retrieve the key from an unbootable hard disc.
It seems most netbooks don't ship with the operating system on a DVD and you can't download the Windows 7 Starter Edition that is common on them. Windows registration keys are specific to particular editions of the operating system, so you can't just use another Windows 7 DVD to install from. Fortunately, you can create your own bootable Windows 7 Starter Edition DVD or USB drive.
You can do this by downloading another edition of Windows from the links on the Dell support site, which is also where I found the solution.
Simply edit a file called ei.cfg in the sources folder. So, if you download Windows 7 "Ultimate", you can relabel it in the ei.cfg file to "Starter".
I should point out that the Novacorp WinToFlash software Dell recommend for burning Windows to bootable discs seems to be bloatware, no matter which site you download it from. I recommend ImgBurn instead.
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