Help: New Dell Vista OEM on Sony Vaio

peejay1986

I have a legitimate Dell Vista Business OEM which I received through work. It was unused and was never going to be so I installed it on a Sony Vaio laptop. Problem is now it would evaluate as its not a Dell machine. Is there any way around this? If I were to call Microsoft would they entertain this question or would what I'm trying to do be considered illegal? I really don't know. I don't particularly want to uninstall Vista AGAIN as we've spent ages installing programs, moving document and doing updates.

Can anyone help?

Thanks!

BKtje

If it's a Dell oem cd it would have been installed on whatever Dell laptop it came with meaning that it's already "locked" to that laptop (even if you or anyone else outside of Dell never installed it or the paper seal on the case was never broken).

I've never heard of Dell sending out an OS cd without having it on a laptop to go with it and therefore the licence has already been used. If your 100% positive that this was never installed (or pre-installed by Dell) on another laptop then i guess you could give MS a call and see what they say but i'd be surprised if they let you.

peejay1986

B-K-DzR wrote: »

If it's a Dell oem cd it would have been installed on whatever Dell laptop it came with meaning that it's already "locked" to that laptop (even if you or anyone else outside of Dell never installed it or the paper seal on the case was never broken).

I've never heard of Dell sending out an OS cd without having it on a laptop to go with it and therefore the licence has already been used. If your 100% positive that this was never installed (or pre-installed by Dell) on another laptop then i guess you could give MS a call and see what they say but i'd be surprised if they let you.

It was 100% never on anything previously. What Dell are doing is shipping Vista with all our orders now. We specify that we want XP Pro on our PCs when we order them but they still have to ship them with a copy of Vista to register it as a Vista sale.

The PCs never have Vista installed on them, only XP Pro.

testicle

peejay1986 wrote: »

It was 100% never on anything previously. What Dell are doing is shipping Vista with all our orders now. We specify that we want XP Pro on our PCs when we order them but they still have to ship them with a copy of Vista to register it as a Vista sale.

The PCs never have Vista installed on them, only XP Pro.

The Vista license has been used for the XP install. Sorry.

peejay1986

testicle wrote: »

The Vista license has been used for the XP install. Sorry.

Again, I don't want to come across like I know everything, far from it which is why i'm asking for help. But I do know that that is not the case because I've done this before and used the spare Vista disc on my personal Dell laptop. I was able to active that no problem and both my laptop and the computer it came shipped with are working perfectly with 2 different licenses.

Basically its them shipping a new Vista disc with all their sales to the company, even though we get XP installed on them. I had no problem installing one Vista disc on my laptop (Dell Inspiron) but I ran in to issues installing another disc on my GF's laptop (Sony Vaio) as its not a Dell and it won't activate, so it is going to stop working in roughly a week.

I appreciate everyone's help on the matter

lynchie

peejay1986 wrote:

Again, I don't want to come across like I know everything, far from it which is why i'm asking for help. But I do know that that is not the case because I've done this before and used the spare Vista disc on my personal Dell laptop. I was able to active that no problem and both my laptop and the computer it came shipped with are working perfectly with 2 different licenses.

Yes, that worked for you as it was a dell laptop not a Sony. BUT, what you done is against the license. You can either install Vista using the license or install XP, you can't install both on separate machines.

peejay1986 wrote:

Basically its them shipping a new Vista disc with all their sales to the company, even though we get XP installed on them. I had no problem installing one Vista disc on my laptop (Dell Inspiron) but I ran in to issues installing another disc on my GF's laptop (Sony Vaio) as its not a Dell and it won't activate, so it is going to stop working in roughly a week.

I appreciate everyone's help on the matter

Dell's oem build of Vista / XP have checks in them to prevent them from running on non Dell equipment. It does this by checking the bios manufacturer. You wont be able to get around this on the Sony. You need a generic oem / retail copy of vista to install on the vaio.

BKtje

But I do know that that is not the case because I've done this before and used the spare Vista disc on my personal Dell laptop.

Just because you done it doesn't mean that it's legit. If testicle is right than the XP you get on the Dell is linked to the Vista licence. You would still be able to install Vista on another machine and activate it.

You need to ring Microsoft about this as they are the ones who will ultimately know. I would be very surprised however if they will activate the dell licenced vista installed on the vaio.

I wish you luck however and let us know how you get on for future queries

EDIT: Guess you can ignore this post since Lynchie answerd it for you.

Capt'n Midnight

peejay1986 wrote: »

I have a legitimate Dell Vista Business OEM which I received through work. It was unused and was never going to be so I installed it on a Sony Vaio laptop. Problem is now it would evaluate as its not a Dell machine. Is there any way around this? If I were to call Microsoft would they entertain this question or would what I'm trying to do be considered illegal? I really don't know. I don't particularly want to uninstall Vista AGAIN as we've spent ages installing programs, moving document and doing updates.

Can anyone help?

Thanks!

OEM is bound to the machine it shipped with and live/dies with it. You can't move it to a different machine FULL STOP.


If it was the other way around where you have a Laptop with a Vista Business License you could downgrade it to XP but you would have to supply your own media, and you still have the same problems. But your laptop doesn't have a Vista license so you have two options, upgrade XP to vista in which case the vista license live/dies with laptop. Or you could buy a copy of non-OEM vista and install it, and move it to a new pc when the laptop dies.

If you have no budget then live with the os preinstalled on the Sony or get linux/bsd/opensolaris etc.