Hacker News Reader

Comment by ungruntled | Hacker News Reader

I've been using Windows XP VMs without activation, or even a prompt to activate. I didn't know they even needed activation. Does anyone know what activation is needed for?

View on HN

If you ever worked in IT during the XP era, you got your hands on a private Volume License Key. XP VLKs bypassed activation, and they were the piracy tool of choice until Microsoft started blacklisting them[1].

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volume_licensing#Leaked_keys

I installed so many Windows XP systems back in the day (manually of course) that I memorized the product key.

FCKGW?

this is the way

FCKGW-RHQQ2-YXRKT-8TG6W-2B7Q8 if I remember correctly. And the famous image: https://web.archive.org/web/20140621130744/http://www.harshj...

Yep, the devil's own.

If Microsoft had panache they'd release a final Windows XP ISO that would only take that key.

I still have a windows 98 first edition key memorized. And 26 digits of Pi. But recently I forgot the 4 digit PIN for my debit card and required a reset.

Just set your pin to the first four digits of the product key.

or find a product key that contains 3141

Normally Windows XP would lock you out completely after a while if you don't activate. But there are a lot of exceptions, like volume license keys, certain OEM install discs, certain VM images released by MS, and ahem unofficial ISOs with things like AntiWPA slipstreamed into the install.

I actually just ran into this the other weekend. After a certain amount of time (30 days?), Windows will prompt you to activate, and if you don't, it kicks you to the login screen.

> I've been using Windows XP VMs without activation, or even a prompt to activate.

If you go into properties, does it show XP isn't activated? IIRC, early XP releases didn't nag from the tray. I've also seen some Dell installs that auto activated after pulling the key from BIOS.

It says it's activated. I think this is because I was using one of those Windows XP compatibility isos that Microsoft made available for download a long time ago (as far as I remember).

There was an update, Windows Genuine Advantage, that was not part of the original XP installers that did the nagging about you using a shady key IIRC. The trick was to not install it, which was easy enough since you had total control of updates back then.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com