Can Windows XP still be activated?

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  • Windows XP in embedded form, which is called Windows Embedded Standard 2009 or Windows Embedded POSReady 2009, has extended support from Microsoft until April 2019. The embedded versions of XP do not have activation.

    "Regular" Windows XP does require activation, and as been pointed out here, can be activated using the phone procedure - you enter your product id through your phone keypad and MS gives you the activation code - which can be received as a text message. I suggest calling from a cell phone because it is easier to get the activation code that way.

  • i've been installing xp a good bit lately, usually using a dell or hp install disk on some dell or hp laptops. When I did the register by phone option, when I finished, it told me to write down the activation codes and they could be used again.

    so I have 2 different activiation codes that microsoft gave me and I'v used them to install xp sp2 on several different dell and hp computers. (that had xp license stickers)
    the oem license key is embedded somewhere in the bios as I never have to actually type in the license key, just the activation code after windows is installed.

    i haven't been able to activate over the internet in about a year, for xp.

    Xp is still useful for somethings....

  • You cannot activate over internet anymore since the internet servers for XP activation has been long gone.

  • @BF10 said:
    You cannot activate over internet anymore since the internet servers for XP activation has been long gone.

    Are you saying that people can't access the internet in Windows XP anymore? So even if you tried using a router or modem, or even AOL, it still won't work? Anyway, ever since last week, when I installed Windows XP Home Edition SP2 in VirtualBox, when I log in to XP, I get a notification saying that I have 30 days left to activate the OS, and it requires me to use the internet, which I can't do because I can't connect to the internet in virtual machines with Windows XP and under.

  • In general a person can access the Internet just fine under XP. There are even recent third party builds of Pale Moon (New Moon) and Firefox for Windows XP.

    The main problem is the old unremovable IE 6, which is used as the embedded core for many shitty desktop applications including their activation program, does not support recent encryption methods. Install SP 3, IE 8, and whatever other updates you can find, and you might be able to activate.

    Although, the only way to tell if their activation servers are working at this moment is if someone tries it, succeeds, and reports here.

    Just remember, this will happen to your precious Windows 7 and Windows 10 eventually too. You are tied to Microsoft. Enjoy your Windows Genuine Advantage.

  • @SomeGuy said:

    The main problem is the old unremovable IE 6, which is used as the embedded core for many shitty desktop applications including their activation program, does not support recent encryption methods. Install SP 3, IE 8, and whatever other updates you can find, and you might be able to activate.

    I'm sure you can remove Internet Explorer 6 from Windows XP. I'm sure Nathan Lineback from Toastytech has done that type of method. Because after all, IE is EVIL :D
    Back on topic, I do have SP3 in my Windows XP Home Edition VM in VirtualBox, but it still gives me notifications saying "You have 30 days left to activate", which I can't do because it requires internet connection, which I can't get in virtual machines. I failed at using AOL to connect to the internet because it required me to be connected to a modem. I thought America Online is used to connect to the internet without networking hardware, but really it's not.

  • @JonathonWyble said:

    I'm sure you can remove Internet Explorer 6 from Windows XP. I'm sure Nathan Lineback from Toastytech has done that type of method. Because after all, IE is EVIL :D
    Back on topic, I do have SP3 in my Windows XP Home Edition VM in VirtualBox, but it still gives me notifications saying "You have 30 days left to activate", which I can't do because it requires internet connection, which I can't get in virtual machines. I failed at using AOL to connect to the internet because it required me to be connected to a modem. I thought America Online is used to connect to the internet without networking hardware, but really it's not.

    Have you installed the VirtualBox Guest Additions in your VM? It should work fine then.

  • @Lenovo1984 said:

    @JonathonWyble said:

    I'm sure you can remove Internet Explorer 6 from Windows XP. I'm sure Nathan Lineback from Toastytech has done that type of method. Because after all, IE is EVIL :D
    Back on topic, I do have SP3 in my Windows XP Home Edition VM in VirtualBox, but it still gives me notifications saying "You have 30 days left to activate", which I can't do because it requires internet connection, which I can't get in virtual machines. I failed at using AOL to connect to the internet because it required me to be connected to a modem. I thought America Online is used to connect to the internet without networking hardware, but really it's not.

    Have you installed the VirtualBox Guest Additions in your VM? It should work fine then.

    I don't think I did. But now that you said that, I think I'll get some guest additions for VirtualBox and see if I can solve my VM problems from there.

  • @JonathonWyble said:

    @Lenovo1984 said:

    @JonathonWyble said:

    I'm sure you can remove Internet Explorer 6 from Windows XP. I'm sure Nathan Lineback from Toastytech has done that type of method. Because after all, IE is EVIL :D
    Back on topic, I do have SP3 in my Windows XP Home Edition VM in VirtualBox, but it still gives me notifications saying "You have 30 days left to activate", which I can't do because it requires internet connection, which I can't get in virtual machines. I failed at using AOL to connect to the internet because it required me to be connected to a modem. I thought America Online is used to connect to the internet without networking hardware, but really it's not.

    Have you installed the VirtualBox Guest Additions in your VM? It should work fine then.

    I don't think I did. But now that you said that, I think I'll get some guest additions for VirtualBox and see if I can solve my VM problems from there.

    Yep, that would be your issue. I believe there is a way to insert the CD image under the devices tab (or one of the tabs at the top, I can't remember). It will install network drivers, graphics drivers (enables modes such as seamless), audio drivers and anything else it needs.

  • edited November 2018

    Network problems with VM on XP sounds a bit unusual to me. Both VBox and VM offer an option to emulate AMD PCnet and network should work out of the box. They work without additional driver even on Windows 98. Recently I could launch IE, FF, NN on Win 98 VM and they worked just fine... it's just that the msn page couldn't load. But Google loads (mostly) fine. If something about network is not working, try switching it to the bridged network from NAT, or vice versa. I'm pretty sure you can even use samba if you set it to bridged.

    Anyways, XP indeed still has some uses these days. As far as I know, Pale Moon is the only modern browser that has a build that doesn't require SSE2 instruction. And the only platform it runs is Windows. There used to be a Linux build as well, but it's been years since it's discontinued. That means Windows XP is the only OS that lets me browse the internet on my old Athlon XP computer. It even lets you log in to almost all modern web services like Dropbox and OneDrive....

  • @JonathonWyble said:
    I'm sure you can remove Internet Explorer 6 from Windows XP. I'm sure Nathan Lineback from Toastytech has done that type of method. Because after all, IE is EVIL :D

    Actually, nLite does have an option to remove IE from 2000/XP/2003 installation media and a 2000/XPlite product also exists. Unfortunately, many non-Microsoft products from that era and beyond rely on IE; Acrobat 8 Pro requires IE6 and even some Bible CD-ROM lists Windows 95 and IE6 as its minimum requirements (I feel bad for any misled win95 users :angry:)

  • Just joined the site, I can verify that XP can still be activated via the usual method as I am typing this from Firefox on my 15 year old Compaq Presario V2310 that I paid $3.00 for at Value Village some several months ago (I bought XP Pro in March of 2008 for $225ish in the box).

    What I had to do was run it inactivated and install a few update rollups first to bring it up to speed. I hypothesize the problem activating from SP1 is that it points to a different source for activation than is currently used by SP3 to activate Windows XP. The real battle for me though was getting internet working in the first place, seems my current Charter internet does not like XP's older network configuration, once SP1 was on there, WiFi was happy.

  • Just few days ago, on December 5, I activated WXP SP3 on my IBM ThinkPad A31. The online activation did not work, the smartphone text message activation never arrived, but the old on the phone method worked perfectly. It's kind of cumbersome, but hey - it works !!!.
    Also all of the updates and upgrades that were released up to April 2014 are still available for download.

    Is also still possible to receive the updates for the WXP POS after the registry hack.

  • edited December 2018

    I was able to activate online December 9. I use virtualbox and suggest you follow these instructions: https://www.hecticgeek.com/2016/02/enable-internet-windows-xp-virtualbox/ to check your settings. The instructions say to use the NAT but go with the host adaptor. Also install the guest additions. The full screen mode is great.

    Let me emend that. Go with the bridged adaptor. Also the intel drivers do not necessarily need to be installed but you may get better network performance.

  • @CromagnonPlayer , it probably depends on where do you live, because the majority of people above who had issues with online activation do have functional internet connections in XP.

    Also, if anyone is going to activate XP through internet should install IE7, so XP will be able to connect to HTTPS secure servers

  • @SomeGuy said:
    Just remember, this will happen to your precious Windows 7 and Windows 10 eventually too. You are tied to Microsoft. Enjoy your Windows Genuine Advantage.

    I am waiting for the day, where canonical introduces product activation for some enterprise functionality they might add one day.
    No loss for the free users, just a benefit for the paying ones.

  • I've activated Windows XP without issues on a few of my machines at home by installing IE8 and the POSReady2009 registry, granted, it has SP3 in the installation CDs themselves with the drivers per system within the past few months or more. Also, if you want to activate XP using the Internet, install IE8, POSReady2009 registry, and make sure the time and date is set correctly. I cannot seem to get Server 2003 activated at all either.

    Go here in case that doesn't work (if you get an error code 32777): https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/816897/message-number-32777-error-message-when-you-try-to-activate-windows-se

  • edited December 2018

    You can't even update Server 2003 or Vista anymore. The updating service uses an entire core without finding anything. Apparently you might get somewhere if you wait 72 hours but I'm onto another OS by then.

    I've lost my Ultimate Extras to this update conundrum. :(

  • It takes three weeks to update, at least for this guy:

    http://www.os2museum.com/wp/three-weeks/

  • @win32 said:
    You can't even update Server 2003 or Vista anymore. The updating service uses an entire core without finding anything. Apparently you might get somewhere if you wait 72 hours but I'm onto another OS by then.

    I've lost my Ultimate Extras to this update conundrum. :(

    Server 2003 giving you trouble? That's basically XP so you shouldn't have a problem there... You may need this update first: windowsupdateagent30-x86. I don't have a link for it, but search for it on Google and you should find it. Also uncheck SSL 2.0 and check TLS 1.0 in the Internet Properties.

    Now, the latest version of WIndows Update for Vista IS broken. This started even before support was cut, and MS knew about it but never fixed it. I guess it was so close to EOL and it had so few users that they just stopped caring. Plus they were still trying to push Windows 10 on everybody.

  • edited January 2019

    The activation issues with XP and 2003 are just the tip of the iceberg.

    Do you have a copy of Ulead Media Studio 8 or Video Studio 11? You may as well toss them in the trash because neither program can access their former activation servers anymore. And Corel (they bought Ulead) is known for sweeping relatively recent but superseded versions of their programs under the rug...

    I'm also a little nervous about Serif MoviePlus X6, which can be reliably considered the newest commercial video editing program that runs stably on win2k extended kernel. The base program only requires a product key, but exporting and importing files require "unlock keys". When connected to the web the program will obtain them from the unlock servers automatically but when offline, the keys can be manually retrieved through telephone and Internet support. Unfortunately Serif discontinued the MoviePlus line a few years ago so time to collect the keys is running out and the unlucky win2k guys will be left in the lurch.

    If the root servers get knocked out and the undersea cables get severed, oh boy...

  • If the root servers get knocked out and the undersea cables get severed, oh boy...

    We would have way bigger problems than activating old software...

  • @BlueSun said:

    If the root servers get knocked out and the undersea cables get severed, oh boy...

    We would have way bigger problems than activating old software...

    Yeah, the bootup online activation check on a heartbeat-machine ;)

  • Online activation has been fixed on Windows XP. Apparently the applicable internal certificates were updated recently after expiring in the past.

    https://msfn.org/board/topic/177534-how-to-activate-windows-xp-online-in-2018/page/2/#comments

  • @SomeGuy said:
    In general a person can access the Internet just fine under XP. There are even recent third party builds of Pale Moon (New Moon) and Firefox for Windows XP.

    The main problem is the old unremovable IE 6, which is used as the embedded core for many shitty desktop applications including their activation program, does not support recent encryption methods. Install SP 3, IE 8, and whatever other updates you can find, and you might be able to activate.

    Although, the only way to tell if their activation servers are working at this moment is if someone tries it, succeeds, and reports here.

    Just remember, this will happen to your precious Windows 7 and Windows 10 eventually too. You are tied to Microsoft. Enjoy your Windows Genuine Advantage.

    Microsoft DID pull the plug. Installed XP home from my recovery disc from my Dell tower (dont remember the model) on Parallels, so my friend had a similar model with an COA key sticker for home. Tried activating, to no avail. I just had to take a snapshot and revert after 30 days. Phone activation was such a mess (I dont know how) so I gave up.

    Windows 10 is definitely gonna have its servers up for the rest of eternity unless Satya Nadella changes his mind and releases Windows 11 or somethin.

  • @win32 said:
    The activation issues with XP and 2003 are just the tip of the iceberg.

    Do you have a copy of Ulead Media Studio 8 or Video Studio 11? You may as well toss them in the trash because neither program can access their former activation servers anymore. And Corel (they bought Ulead) is known for sweeping relatively recent but superseded versions of their programs under the rug...

    I'm also a little nervous about Serif MoviePlus X6, which can be reliably considered the newest commercial video editing program that runs stably on win2k extended kernel. The base program only requires a product key, but exporting and importing files require "unlock keys". When connected to the web the program will obtain them from the unlock servers automatically but when offline, the keys can be manually retrieved through telephone and Internet support. Unfortunately Serif discontinued the MoviePlus line a few years ago so time to collect the keys is running out and the unlucky win2k guys will be left in the lurch.

    If the root servers get knocked out and the undersea cables get severed, oh boy...

    I dont activate Corel 3, just use a cracker. And btw, do older versions of Corel kill WIndows 10? I LITERALLY had to reset my computer because of that i guess....

  • @Jack Sunders said:
    unless Satya Nadella changes his mind and releases Windows 11 or somethin.

    Not going to happen in like a million years.

  • There are 8 different releases of Windows 10.

    Any one of them could have easily been Windows 11. They haven't, despite the fact the current releases are far different from the initial release. This is because Microsoft wants to update Windows every once in a while, making whatever changes they want, without making a full new version, or having to treat it as a service pack.

  • @robobox said:
    There are 8 different releases of Windows 10.

    Actually, I think they’re up to 9 at this point. I like how the version number is supposed to be the year and month of the release but the last several releases have been late.

    Also, looks like they’re probably going to go with 2004 for the next release, I’m guessing to avoid confusion when they release the Windows Server companion, because if they followed the previous pattern, it’d be Windows Server 2003, which, you know, already exists...

  • @robobox said:
    Any one of them could have easily been Windows 11. They haven't, despite the fact the current releases are far different from the initial release. This is because Microsoft wants to update Windows every once in a while, making whatever changes they want, without making a full new version, or having to treat it as a service pack.

    Pretty much the same as what Apple's been doing with MacOS since all the way back in 2001.

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