Clean Vista install WITH NO ACTIVATION

If you installed Windows 7, ABR does not yet work with it. If you installed Vista, then please check the backup files and make sure they both contain some information. The Vista installation must be the one done at the factory, and cannot be updated to another version, such as if you used anytime upgrade to switch from Home Premium to Ultimate.

 

It was Windows 7 I used.

 

i can confirm this works...
i ran the backup, extracted the backup file, and it contains the OEM key and cert

 

Hello Orev,

I don't know if this question has already been asked and answered or not but I was wondering if this scenario would work:

Let's say I'm doing this on a blank hard drive.
1. Do a clean install using the product key on the sticker on the bottom of my laptop. The sticker product key is for Vista Business and I'm reinstalling the same.
2. Call MS and activate over the phone.
3. After activation is completed and Vista is running normally, does my laptop now have an activation certification file and a record of the product key hidden somewhere deep within the recesses of Vista?
4. If so, can I use ABR to capture the now present activation certification file and the key, thus generating the "backup-cert.xrm-ms" and "backup-key.txt" files, respectively? ABR simply captures these two entities and generates a file for each during the backup phase, no? And it restores them during the restore phase, yes?

If I understand this correctly, a PC that was activated with a valid product key should have the activation certification file and, of course, a record of the product key. Doesn't the very nature of a PC with Vista being in the "activated" state imply that an activation certification file must be present, along with a record of the valid product key? Otherwise, how can Vista be in an "activated" stated WITHOUT the activation certification file and record of the valid key? Please clarify if I've got this mistaken.

Will this method work? Or will the ABR not be able to capture the activation certification file and the record of the product key? I've read that the ABR should be applied to the OEM install, the untouched and unaltered, from the factory state of the OS. Can you please confirm?

If ABR can do this, after installing and activating as outlined above, then I can do future clean installs as many times as I need without calling MS for activation, right? Please correct me if I'm wrong on this point.

Many thanks for your guide and your continued contributions on these forums.

 

If you do a clean install there wont be any backup certificate file. These are present in OEM installations only.

 

Thank you for your reply. I've edited my original post to make it clearer.

 

Vista keeps track of activation differently when activated over the phone/online vs when activated by the OEM. ABR is only designed to work with the OEM method. Your steps will not work when using ABR to try to backup the activation.

 

Ah, okay. Bummer. Thanks for clearing that up.

 

There's a beta release for ABR that supports Windows 7. Anybody care to give it a try?

 

So far the reports I've been getting are mostly positive. Seems to be working well for most people.

 

Hey orev. I'm planning to buy HP Envy 15. this might be a stupid question: since it doesn't come with a built-in optical drive, I was wondering if i could still perform a clean install with an external optical drive?

 

This is offtopic for this thread, but you can transfer the Win 7 install files to a usb drive and install from that. There are a few tools available that make this very easy. Google can tell you how.

 

Oops. My apologies. I just thought since the beta release of ABR works for win7, I could ask that question. Thanks a lot for your help though!

 

Guys, any1 help me plz. i m new in HP Laptop. i used to use dell. anyway, just yesterday i bought dv6-210ea laptop(core i7). after that i have fresh installed my own bought operating system which is Windows 7 ultimate 64bit. everything is fine with driver installation except the quickset button. i have installed the appropriate version from their website and installation was successful as well. but when i touch the volume button i can't see any pop up windows where it normally shows the level, u knw what i mean. and even if i click on Caps lock button, it doesn't show anything in the screen. guys i m new in hp so i don't knw which order or how to install this stuff. plz help me...

 

Question fellas.

Can I take activation files from one language version windows 7 and put it into another and make a succesfull activation?

Lets say I have a cert files from German Windows 7 and want to activate English version ?

 

Yes, this should work fine, as long as it's the same edition (Premium, Ultimate, etc...)

 

Thanks, will give it a try tomorrow from a start, tried today but no luck with activating in and dont know what the problem is...

maybe:

Turn off the Wireless Network switch and unplug any network cables.

Do you think this have any effect and we really need to do it?

 

Network or anything else will not effect activation. However, I assume you are using ABR to originally backup the OEM activation and also using it to restore. Hardware changes will only effect non-OEM activation. Is this what you are doing?

 

No, I use other program, since ABR does not support win7 yet, or it does?

I used this:

Rongchaua's blog Windows 7 Activation Backup and Restore

PS, I am starting with everything from start, will report in 1h if it works this time...
PSS, just found out there is a beta ABR version, will test it!

 

Worked great man, good job!

Tested on windows 7 home premium 64 bit.

 

Thank you very much for this util, worked on my new Envy 17 (after trying to get the full version to work without success, the beta version has done the job).

 

didnt work for me

 

I know that a clean install erases the recovery partition along with all the bloatware that came pre-installed. Since quickplay is also lost, is there anyway to install it? How would it be done if I forgot to backup the "swsetup" folder?

 

You might be able to get back the software from the recovery discs using this guide: Accessing HP Recovery Disc Files | directedge.us

I have not tried to reinstall QuickPlay, so you will have to figure it out yourself. I'm pretty sure it uses a separate partition, so I'm not sure if the setup program will create that, or if you need to do it manually.

 

hey orev:

# OEM Re-Installation Disc: (This one requires a bit more fiddling than the others, so consider it for more advanced users) Some OEMs ship their systems with a "re-installation disc". This disc may be be customized by the OEM to install only one version of Vista, but those customizations can usually be "undone" using vLite, and then will allow you to install any version (that you have a license for) from that disc. This modification removes some of the custom scripts that an OEM uses to automate the Vista installation. Sometimes they also customize the windows install files, but I think they just add drivers to them. Using this method does not give you a "pristine" install disc, but it should be enough to work. An example where you could do this is if you have a Dell Vista Business disc at work that only allows you to install Vista Business. You can modify this disc to allow you to install Home Premium on your home laptop.

* For Dell discs:
1. Copy the entire Dell DVD to a folder on your hard drive
2. In the "sources" folder, there is a folder called "$oem$". Delete it
3. In the "sources" folder, there is a file called "pid.txt". Delete it.
4. Open vLite and burn a new disc using those files
5. Install vista. It should now allow you to choose a version of Vista to install, and also will not install the dell product key and activation files
(Thanks to Silas Awaketh for the info that helped me figure this out)
* Dell is currently the only OEM I have info for. If you have a disc from another OEM, please let me know and we can figure out how to add it.


I have 3 laptops with vista premium one which i have rec. discs for and that is a Sony Vaio came with 3 dvd's all three completely full i extracted the disc 1 and that seems that had all the information on it need the other 2 seems as if everything on them is Sony related so i am assuming i will not be needing any of that from discs 2 and 3 and the boot folder in them match the disc 1. i tried looking through the extracted disc one and could not find much to eliminate the Sony OS from it in order to use it bootable with the other 2 laptops, one of them which is Toshiba one dell. I might not be all that clear but i need little more input of what to remove from the discs so in order i have one for all three of the laptops.

any help would be great

thanks in advance

 

What you have are Recovery Discs and those in general cannot be used to perform a clean install. You are better off downloading a real ISO image of the Vista install or borrowing a DVD from someone else. There are legal places where you can download the discs (search). Downloading is not illegal since you already have a license to the software.

If you want to modify the Recovery Discs to perform a clean install, that would be completely unsupported and also very customized for each recovery disc. You will have to figure that out on your own.

 

any links that you guys might have i tried a few torrents but 90% of them are cracked seems as if none are oem licensed.

and thanks for your quick reply

 

All official Vista DVDs are the same. There is no difference between OEM and Retail discs. If you find versions that claim to be "OEM", they are probably also cracked and may come with viruses, etc...

The main guide in this thread contains md5sums of the official ISO files, both original release and with SP1 integrated. If you google on those md5sums, you should be able to easily track down one of the official/safe ISOs. Note there has since been a release of an ISO with integrated SP2, though I don't have that in the guide.

 

Cannot download file? Am I the only one?

 

The ABR beta does support Windows 7, so use that. I haven't gotten around to promoting it to a "real" release, but there haven't been any issues reported with the beta.

 

@orev, thanks so much for your ABR. I made the activation backup with no problem. I just installed win7 SP1 so I have not tried that yet.

The other program have been removed from the various mirrors or something is funny with my JDownloader. In any case I was just fooling around.

 

that guide is useless as all the links to the required software are DEAD!

 

Hi guys, quick question:
I want to do a clean Win7 install, and I am about to use abr to do the activation thingy. Now I am about to download Windows 7 from the legal links (other thread on the forum). My Vaio came with Win7 Home Premium in German.
Is the activation also language sensible? I mean do I need the german version again or will it work if I give it a try with Win7 Home premium in English this time?
many thanx

 

The language does not matter.

 

Great! Downloading now... will give it a try. Thanks!

 

I hate Vista. Very nice guide though. Thank you.

 

How can I do this on a Compaq Presario CQ60? I only have a recovery partition and no WAU folder.

 

You can do this as long as you can get a standard Vista DVD to install from, and the drivers for your computer from their web site. There is no strict need for the WAU folder or any of the preinstalled software setup files -- you just won't be able to reinstall them later, so if you need any of those, make sure you find another way to get them.

 

Hi,

Does a Vista 32-bit Home Premium CD contain Vista 64-bit Home Premium?

 

No. It's 32-bit only. You need the 64-bit DVD/ISO to get 64-bit.

 

Hello, I am having quite a bit of trouble getting this to work. I have a new HP laptop that came with Windows 7 home premium. Before reinstalling windows, I ran ABR 1.7 beta, and both files were made on my flash drive. After the clean install, I ran the restore, and it seemed that it worked, but I realized earlier that it told me I had twenty or so days left to activate my copy of windows. I just now ran the restore twice. The first time, I told it to proceed even though it said it appeared that it was already activated. I restarted and was not prompted to enter any product key, but when I reached my desktop it informed me that my cope of windows is "not genuine." I tried running the restore again, again telling it to proceed even though it appeared to be activated, then restarted, and at this point I was asked for the product key before getting to my desktop. I entered the product key given in the backup-key file made by ABR. Still it's telling me that the copy is not genuine. A couple of things to note: According to this ( http://forum.notebookreview.com/win...-7-download-links-just-like-vista-before.html) thread, it was okay to remove the ei.cfg file before burning the .iso to create a Win7 DVD. I did so and installed Windows 7 Professional, which isn't what came with my laptop. Another thing to note is that I tried to activate my copy using the product key on the bottom of my laptop and in the backup-key file after realizing that my copy didn't appear to be activated after running the restore. Any ideas what went wrong and how I might be able to fix it?

 

The keys are version specific, you cannot activate professional using a key meant for home premium.

 

Hello, I have a Packard Bell laptop with Vista Home Premium 32bit on it, I tried this guide and everything seemed to have worked fine except the activation part. If i run activation-restore.exe again it tells me that it's already activated but in System Properties it still tells me that I have 30 days left to activate. I tried typing the key from the backup-key file but it gives me error 0xc004e003. Am I doing something wrong?

I forgot to say that I made a bootable dvd from the WAUUPGRD folder I had on my C drive and that's how I reinstalled Vista.

 

You can try this to see the activation status:

1. Open a command prompt As Administrator
2. Type: slmgr.vbs /dli

You can manually activate by doing this:

1. Open a command prompt As Administrator
2. Type, replacing XXXX with the product key in the backup file: slmgr.vbs /ipk XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX...
3. Type, replacing file with full path to file: slmgr.vbs /ilc C:\path\to\backup-file.xrm-ms

 

Thanks for your response, I tried what you said, this is what I get after typing the first thing:

Name: Windows(TM) Vista HomePremium edition
Description: Windows Operating System - Vista, OEM_SLP channel
Partial Product Key: MQ3CQ
License Status: Initial grace period
Time remaining: 42780 minute(s) (29 day(s))

The other two commands appeared to be successful but after typing the first command again I still got the same message as before. Any more help is really appreciated, thanks.

 

It's hard to say. The basic assumptions would be that you have to install the same edition of Vista you backed up from, so the original license would have to be for Home Premium. It's also possible the backup xrm-ms file is corrupt. If that's the case, there's no way to really get it back since you already reinstalled. You can try renaming it with a .xml extension and then open it in Internet Explorer and see if it has any errors. We're getting pretty far into deep technical debugging area though.

P.S. Make sure to reboot.

 

Hmm well I made sure to pick Home Premium when making the iso file and reinstalling, so that's out I guess. I opened the xrm-ms file as an xml file and it seemed fine, the browser should report an error if something's invalid, right? Can editing something from it help with anything? If not, is there any chance that another Vista reinstall might not get into the same problem? Otherwise, it looks like I'll have to resort to the recovery dvd. Will that take care of the problem, or do I have to activate Windows manually in that case too? Oh and I did reboot, but no luck

 

Recovery DVD would definitely work, and would allow you another chance at running the backup, though you probably want to reinstall again to get a clean install. Only other thing I can think of is that the SLIC table in the BIOS might be missing. This could be caused by a BIOS update, if you did that recently. Otherwise, I don't know.

 

Nope, I haven't made any updates. I googled a bit about this SLIC table and it looks like I have it, version 2.0. Guess I'll try another reinstall and then the recovery dvd. Thanks for your help.

Edit: Without expecting any results, I tried changing the product key to the one I have on the sticker and somehow it worked. I don't know if that was supposed to happen, but finally, it's activated.

 

Sticker key is regular OEM key that doesn't care about SLIC/OEM Offline activation. Technically, totally different thing