Notebooks & Netbooks

[tastelessone]

My old Acer Aspire 5050 got a new lease on life in the form of 4GB of RAM to replace its original 1GB. But the old installation of Windows XP Media Center 2005 that came pre-installed is still slowing things up. Just too much guck built up over the years, so to speak.

I'm thinking seriously about blowing the whole thing up--wiping the hard drive and giving it a fresh install of Windows. I have the CDs (Windows XP Media Center 2005) and I have the Windows license key on the base of my laptop. I have already:

• Removed all my important files from the laptop.
• Downloaded and saved all the driver and application files from Acer, making sure I have the right ones.
• Don't really care about the present settings and applications.

The nagging question I have is: when I start installing Windows from my CDs and am prompted for the license key am I gonna see a message that says, "Hold on, Bubba, you can't use THAT key for this installation"?

[Acer-Travis]

If you're using Acer's recovery media that you either created on your own or had sent to you, it should not prompt you to install the OEM Windows OS Product Key.

[tastelessone · Accepted solution]

I made the discs as instructed, but I would prefer a clean install, with only the necessary drivers and utilities. Took a chance and did the install. The license key on the base of my laptop was accepted. Not done yet, but good so far.