As many people have now figured out there are more than one version of Windows XP Professional Edition (that can be purchased/obtained as legal copies). From what I have understood there are as follows: Windows XP Professional (Full) Windows XP Professional Licenses (no CD) Windows XP Professional Upgrade Windows XP Professional Upgrade (Students) Windows XP Professional Corporate CD (Full) Windows XP Professional SP1 (Full) But what about the OEM CDs? Recently during some routine tech work I have installed the Dell Windows XP Professional SP1 (full) OEM CD. I was reformatting two separate Dell Computers (that were shipped with their individual CDs). Neither required any sort of Activation (similar to a Corporate CD). But then just for testing purposes I installed and then uninstalled a copy off of another older machine (white box) to actually check what type of CD it was. I was boggled by the fact that it then asked for activation. This brings me to my questions: What kind of CDs is Dell shipping with new systems? Is there proprietary code on the CDs that looks for dell hardware? This is all of the information that I was able to find from DELL: http://support.dell.com/us/en/kb/document.asp?DN=1060108 http://support.dell.com/us/en/kb/document.asp?DN=1053642

XP OEM, upgrade, and full are basically the same OS with only minor changes. The main differences lie in the support aspects. Dell and others do purchase licenses and give their own versions so that they can tailor it to their systems which generally use components specifically tailored for their own computer hardware. You can never tell whether or not a new component purchased from the manufacturer will be totally compatible with their MOBOs. That is how they get you to buy parts from them. Compaq is notorious for this and does not even supply original OS disks but simply restore disks. Dell is a lot better and to get to your question, I have reformatted and installed WinXP(upgrade version purchased at Staples) on a number of Dell systems that originally came with Me or win98SE with no problems. If your system has a Dell tag that says "designed for win 2000 or winXP", you should be fine. Any new installation of WinXP will have to be activated. Those that you purchase from Dell with XP installed have probably been activated by them under their license. Activation is no big deal as long as you have a legit copy.

"Compaq is notorious for this and does not even supply original OS disks but simply restore disks." When's the last time you've purchased a Compaq? They've been supplying Windows CD's with their computers for some time now, and with their laptops as long as I can remember. That's above and beyond system restore disks. -=Bryan=-

Bryan, just as a point of interest, I don't know where you are getting your info but I just checked with Compaq/HP and they still supply restore disks =, not original MS OS disks.

So if I am understanding correctly, DELL can insert their own code onto the disk in order to "wave" activation on a machine that they sold. Am I correct on this statement?