Well, life was peachy until her XP install took a nose dive requiring a full reinstall.

After the reinstall I attempted to use the online tool for re-registering my legal copy of XP. No luck. None of the online methods worked. I had not installed new hardware in to the machine and it was installed on to the exact hardware that it was installed on initially. This was going to require a phonecall..to Microsoft.

After working at places that had $10k support contracts with Microsoft and the crappy service I had recieved when actually needing support, I was dreading calling Microsoft for my personal needs.

Actually, it wasn't too bad. I called up the 888 number that the validation tool instructed me to call(when no online options work) I had to do the following:

1. Say the 35 character validation code. I couldn't just say the whole thing at once, nor could I enter it on the phone keypad. I was prompted for each 5 digit sequence 7 times.
2. Say hello to the nice call center person in India
3. Give her the first 5 digits of my validation code
4. Told her the registration code wasn't in use on any other hardware
5. This may be key, she also asked if it was the first time I was installing the code on this hardware, which it wasn't.
6. Enter in another long string of digits which the call center tech told me wrong 3 times

Then after an uncomfortable silence,  I clicked next and my validation was complete. At this point the tech line went dead 'Hello..Is that all' 'Yes, that is all, thank you for calling Micr'

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