I've taken over the IT operations of a small business branch, and discovered that the old IT guy had made use of a leaked volume key to install several of the computers he built. Unfortunately, through windows validation, both I and the computer were made aware that this was a leaked key. Now I'm stuck with 7 computers with highly customized software installed that demand a new windows key. My main concern is I don't want to have to completely reinstall all this customized software back onto 7 computers. My question is, is it possible to purchase an OEM Product Key and swap it in for the bad volume key, and if so how would I do that?

Hello Labjobbs, Welcome back to PCHF!

I will mark your thread as open to encourage those who know among us to come take a look

Thanks for your patience,

Smokeycheech

Hello again, Labjobbs!

You truly were left with a mess there, weren't you.

Hope this helps How to change the Volume Licensing product key on a computer that is running Windows XP Service Pack 1 and later versions of Windows XP

EDIT: What you will need to clean this up is a legit Volume Key for your site, not OEM

Hey labjobbs,

Awesome, the things you get put into your lap huh?

In terms of switching to an OEM key, I have been discussing this with a fellow tech and it seems OEM disks are only available with certain hardware purchases. We're not sure that without purchasing a new system that they ever include a key.

That being said, we have come up on this related Microsoft KB article:
How to change the Volume Licensing product key on a computer that is running Windows XP Service Pack 1 and later versions of Windows XP

These steps should allow you to change over to a valid key provided you have one.

Let me know if that helps

EDIT: beaten to it!

EDIT again:

You will need to have a Volume Licensing Agreement in place with Microsoft in order to get a valid Volume Licensing Key:

http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/

I was under the assumption you can just buy an OEM version of XP and install it on a machine, as long as you don't change your hardware configuration more than a set number of times (3, I think). Here's the link to what I was talking about purchasing
Microsoft Windows XP Pro SP3 OEM Version E85-05683 at TigerDirect.
Is it possible to go from a volume license to a single license like this? The guides included here seem to focus on replacing one volume license with another. Also, I was under the assumption that volume licenses needed to be bought in bulk to be close to worth it. I'd really like to figure out what I need before I just start throwing money at the problem (if only)... :/

Labjobbs,

From what I saw, it seems that to go from a Volume license to an OEM, you will need to format and reinstall.

You can get a VLA with a small number of licenses in the agreement from most major software retailers. Getting the VLA established is step one of getting the VLK ;-)

Ok, that sounds like my best option at the moment. Although, I can't seem to find any place that sells an xp volume license. I am fairly new at sniffing out a volume license though. Would you happen to know a software retailer you'd recommend?