Thinking of buying XP Home on E-bay, any opinions!

[Fordtruckmaniac]

I am thinking of buying an Microsoft XP Home disk on ebay. Has any one had any bad experiences here? I am a little spooked about it. Though I have bought and sold many automotive parts on there with pretty much no problems.

Also does a disk listed as an OEM XP Home work the same as the "Full System Package". I know I at least, need the "Full System" anyway.

I see there are lots of big numbered sellers on there that have good track records. And a few of them offer to make good if the product is D.O.A.  

I wrote on here a while back about getting a computer for free that had XP Pro on it that was badly corrupted with spyware and such.

I was not ever able to get the XP Pro disk that was in it.

P.S. Is there any benefit to using XP Home over ME? I have heard stories of ME being bad. I have had it on my Gateway for 5 years an not so much a peep. I have been looking at the Windows ME software on there as well.

Thanks,

[R0SS]

Don't buy it just stick with ME for now then when Vista come out next year buy that.

R0SS

[Mac]

I am thinking of buying an Microsoft XP Home disk on ebay. Has any one had any bad experiences here? I am a little spooked about it. Though I have bought and sold many automotive parts on there with pretty much no problems.

Also does a disk listed as an OEM XP Home work the same as the "Full System Package". I know I at least, need the "Full System" anyway.

I see there are lots of big numbered sellers on there that have good track records. And a few of them offer to make good if the product is D.O.A.  

I wrote on here a while back about getting a computer for free that had XP Pro on it that was badly corrupted with spyware and such.

I was not ever able to get the XP Pro disk that was in it.

P.S. Is there any benefit to using XP Home over ME? I have heard stories of ME being bad. I have had it on my Gateway for 5 years and not so much a peep. I have been looking at the Windows ME software on there as well.

Thanks,

Check out this link XP Professional

XP Home is lower down the page.

I use ME for four years until the hard drive gave up the ghost. It was running better than many other ME systems I have seen or heard of but only after disabling System Restore and relying on drive imaging instead. (Remember that '98 didn't have System Restore.)

ME was always low on resources and it can't use a lot of RAM, defrag ran slow with a 2 MB drive buffer and ran four times faster with an 8 MB drive buffer, so it depends on what you want to do really.

XP has more system resources, you don't have to re-boot to recover them, it can use 512 MB of RAM easily and many people use 1024 MB which is not so easy to do with ME and is unproductive anyway  due to the basic lack of system resources which are part of ME's architecure.

All NT based systems have more system resources over '9x / ME systems.

64-Bit systems have even more system resources being able to use some 16 GB of RAM for real engineering and computing requirements.

Try XP on the XP computer you were given. Don't tweak, just make sure that it has enough RAM, 512 MB minimum, 1024 MB for really good performance, more only if your applications need it, and check out the system specifications. It would help if you could post them here so we can all have a look.

Processor speed, Bus speed, RAM type, drive speed, buffer size, drive size and so on. What kind of CD/DVD  drives does it have?

Have you had a good look at Open Source software such as Open Office, Audacity, Real Alternative, Xine, Foxit and other good freeware programs?

[GX1_Man]

Don't buy it just stick with ME for now then when Vista come out next year buy that.

R0SS

The more important issue is whether or not your machine has enough horsepower for XP anyway. No doubt it will not have enough for Vista, so ignore that. What are the system specs, and what would you hope to gain with XP that you cannot do now. And if it's not broke why fix it?

[Raptor]

Buy Windows XP Home or Professional in stores so that you are certain that you have obtained a legitimate and useable serial number.

[vibhor_agarwalin]

Give me one plus point why do you want to buy it from Ebay.

[vibhor_agarwalin]

Forgot to mention one thing:

If you face some problem later on will you able to catch hold of that person.  

[vibhor_agarwalin]

With lots of headache free  

[RayG]

Is there any benefit to using XP Home over ME?

It's a better operating system?

I have heard stories of ME being bad.

I've heard some refer to ME as Miserable Edition.  

RayG

[Fordtruckmaniac]

I asked for opinions and I got them. Thanks. Discussion is good.

The "Free" computer has a 40 GB hard drive, 2.4 GHz processor and 256 MB of memory which I plan on upping to 512 at least.

The computer does not have DVD burner, but for myself only, thats not important. My computer use consitists of surfing the web, working with digital camera pictures, and I mean family pictures, with storage of these. Ancestery work with storage of my findings.

Is changing the hard drive form 40 to 80 pretty much plug and play? And or is it needed?

Again, many of the sellers "Will" make the item good and have very high sellers ratings which is good, that means they are safe to do business with. With what I could save here, I could upgrade the memory and hard drive. I could just about soak up the memory for the difference in price.

The systems are said to have "Good COA and unregistered product key numbers". And some of the sellers product are still factory sealed. But yes I know it could be a load.

Also again, is there any difference in the whats called an OEM system verses the Full Version for loading from scratch?

And I in no way mean to be disrespectful in saying this, but I have found with about anything you buy, electrical, your pretty much on your after you buy it anyway. As long as it "did" work when you bought it. Thats the way it is in the automotive field anyway.

Still feel free to comment.

Thanks again,

[dl65]

Fordtruckmaniac...  E bay is a good source of some things .......and there are some very good sellers , however just check them out as best you can.......Remember it's buyer beware .....

Is changing the hard drive form 40 to 80 pretty much plug and play? And or is it needed?

well , are you planning on using this drive for the master drive or just a slave ?

The systems are said to have "Good COA and unregistered product key numbers". And some of the sellers product are still factory sealed.

That's correct , it could be a dealer who is selling off unwanted inventory ........

Also again, is there any difference in the whats called an OEM system verses the Full Version for loading from scratch?

OEM .....means Original Equipment Manufacturer as opposed to RETAIL ( full version ) The differance is the price .....OEM is less , because it doesn't come with the same free support as does the RETAIL version. The license fee paid to M/S is less .......simple as that .
Does one work better than the other......No ......in either case the Operating system is the same .......

Is there any benefit to using XP Home over ME?

ME .....is, in my opinion the ,WORST Operating System
ever .......... or let me put it another way .......If someone offered it to me ......for free ..........as opposed to buying a legal copy of XP .......I'd buy the XP .........There are lots of users with ME installed and a few ......whose names I wont mention , who really like it ........( I have no idea why ) .

Hope this helps you .

dl65  

[Raptor]

OEM .....means Original Equipment Manufacturer as opposed to RETAIL ( full version ) The differance is the price .....OEM is less , because it doesn't come with the same free support as does the RETAIL version. The license fee paid to M/S is less .......simple as that .
Does one work better than the other......No ......in either case the Operating system is the same .......

OEM often:

• Does not come with all functions available (Does not apply to Windows OS)
  
• Does not come with an installation disk (Might come with a restore disk)
  
• Is pre-installed on the system.
  

[Mac]

I asked for opinions and I got them. Thanks. Discussion is good.

The "Free" computer has a 40 GB hard drive, 2.4 GHz processor and 256 MB of memory which I plan on upping to 512 at least.

The computer does not have DVD burner, but for myself only, thats not important. My computer use consists of surfing the web, working with digital camera pictures, and I mean family pictures, with storage of these. Ancestry work with storage of my findings.

Is changing the hard drive form 40 to 80 pretty much plug and play? And or is it needed?

Again, many of the sellers "Will" make the item good and have very high sellers ratings which is good, that means they are safe to do business with. With what I could save here, I could upgrade the memory and hard drive. I could just about soak up the memory for the difference in price.

The systems are said to have "Good COA and unregistered product key numbers". And some of the sellers product are still factory sealed. But yes I know it could be a load.

Also again, is there any difference in the what's called an OEM system verses the Full Version for loading from scratch?

And I in no way mean to be disrespectful in saying this, but I have found with about anything you buy, electrical, your pretty much on your own after you buy it anyway. As long as it "did" work when you bought it. That's the way it is in the automotive field anyway.

Still feel free to comment.

Thanks again,

Nice processor, and you are right to want to increase the amount of RAM as it makes XP very much easier to work with.

With '98se (satanic edition) people were found to be tweaking or exorcising the demons out of the system put there by the misbegotten sons of computing who came like a virus in their Trojan horses and spread around the World communing with each other at an ever growing rate.

As people move to XP we hope to see a more Professional and less Religiously Insane use for computers.  

Keep the 40 GB drive and spend the money on a CD/DVD burner instead unless you really need a lot of space.

Many business computer users won't allow too much data to be kept on the drive without backing up to other media and where legalities are concerned many law firms require there to be hard copy, keeping it in fireproof safes.

Alternatively if the current drive isn't fast enough and has too small a drive buffer think about a bigger one. About $1 per GigaByte seems reasonable although you do hear of bargains from time to time.

If the current drive specification is good and you really do need more storage think of using a slave drive.

From the Power Supply Unit point of view you'll need to allow 5 Watts for each RAM module and 15 Watts for a slave drive.

Why go for a DVD burner? Well if you install XP to a 10 GB drive C: you'll be able to burn a drive image to an 8 GB DVD as the imaging program uses compression. If you ever want to dual boot with Vista you just need another D: partition, and then use E: for your MyDocuments and Email folders.

If you make a good drive image after achieving a clean install you have something to restore with which is better than relying on System Restore.

OEM or Full version is up to you.

Just remember that there are free operating systems and lots of good free software available too.

[Fed]

W2k Rules!
(XP on steroids)
You will come back & thank me one day.  

[GX1_Man]

As Fed said, I have found Windows 2000 Pro to be far and away the best and most stable of the WIndows incarnations. I use Linux, but I do have a Win2000 partition for those WIndows only needs (thankfully very few, and getting less every day!)

No Vista for me!

[Raptor]

And where do I get the Linux you are using?

[GX1_Man]

Have you tried any Linux to this point? Virtually all of the free distros can be downloaded at

www.distrowatch.com

either by http or bittorrent. Just burn the ISO and boot and you are on your way.

Linspire LiveCD can be downloaded free at:

http://media.linspire.com/cnr_linspirelive/

The installable version usually costs, but it frequently is offered substantially reduced or free during special promotions. You can periodically google "free linspire" and you might get lucky. Do you have an extra machine or an empty hard drive that needs the experience?

Linspire has more eye candy than most so they recommend an 800 Mhz processor and 256 RAM as minimum. You can do it on less but it is slower, though just as stable. As I mentioned other versions can run on a lot less. As with Windows more can be better, but certainly not necessary.

Of course the Live CD is going to be slower than a hard drive install. You also will not be able to download through click and run to see how easy ijnstalling programs in because you can't install to a spinning CD running your OS. It is pretty sweet. They don't always have cutting edge last second releases, but what they have is stable. You can download with apt-get like any Debian distro, but because it is a specialized install, it could break the Linspire system. As long as you use click and run, the installs go easily, and if a new version of an installed program is available, it can automatically download the updates!

If you have any "exotic" hardware, Linux lags behind onlyh because the manufacturers only provide Windows drivers and then they have to be reverse engineered.

At the very least it would be an interesting experiment. What kind of computer setup do you have?

[Fordtruckmaniac]

Another question. Where I had in my other post a few weeks ago, about my local computer guru wanting more than I want to spend to reload this coumputer.

He wants to start with a new disk and product key.

Can't he grab from somewhere in this computer the product key number for the XP Pro system thats already installed in it and just use it again? I keep asking him this and he just worms around the issue saying it may be a robbed number or something to that effect. But heck, maybe it not.

I realize I would not have a disk still, but the computer would be healed up, and I could get the proper security measures taken care of to "try" and keep it clean. I have never had to reload my Gateway for any reason in 5 years of healthy use. So I am fairing well with it, and could surely do it again.

Thanks,

[Raptor]

Can't he grab from somewhere in this computer the product key number for the XP Pro system thats already installed in it and just use it again? I keep asking him this and he just worms around the issue saying it may be a robbed number or something to that effect. But heck, maybe it not.  

He is right if:

• The OS was not allready installed when you bought the PC
  
• You do not have a valid license with the serial number
  
• You do not have a sticker with the serial number
  
• You do not have a recovery or installation CD.
  

How much is he charging?

[Fordtruckmaniac]

He is right if:

• The OS was not allready installed when you bought the PC
• You do not have a valid license with the serial number
• You do not have a sticker with the serial number
• You do not have a recovery or installation CD.

How much is he charging?

The OS was already on the computer when it was given to me. The computer was given to me by my sons girlfriend. It was her families computer.

It was a custom built computer for the family. The computer was dead in the water when she gave it to me. She knew I liked to tinker with computers, just to see if I can get them going again.

It was horribly corrupted with spyware and adware and many trojans. They just bought a new computer rather than try and fix this one.

So anyway, no I do not have the valid license with the serial number. Or a start up disk or anything.

But as said, the OS, XP Pro was already installed on the computer and used by them for more than a year. They can't find the disk from where the computer was built. It has been misplaced.

So am I SOL?  

Oh yeah, for a new XP Home disk and license, etc, and to install it he was wanting $160.00 or $180.00.

[merlin_2]

If you have the product key.......ask msoft for a replacement disk.....no comments on emay.....

[Fordtruckmaniac]

Can I myself, access this product information key from within the computer somehow?

Thanks.

[GX1_Man]

Can I myself, access this product information key from within the computer somehow?

Thanks.

Here is a great freeware download. It's legal:

http://www.magicaljellybean.com/keyfinder.shtml

It will give you the info you need.

[Fordtruckmaniac]

Here is a great freeware download. It's legal:

http://www.magicaljellybean.com/keyfinder.shtml

It will give you the info you need.

Thanks, I'll check it out.

[Fordtruckmaniac]

If you have the product key.......ask msoft for a replacement disk.....no comments on emay.....

Can a person request a replacement disk from their web-site? Or how does one go about doing this?

I am going to try the "magic jellybean" route here in little while, if the computer will take the download.

[GX1_Man]

It is a very small download (will fit on a floppy if you need someone else to download it).

[Fordtruckmaniac]

I switched out the computers.

I am on the free one now.

The magic jellybean worked like a charm! It downloaded fine and I now have the XP Pro CD key number.

Now what the heck do I do with it? Is there somewhere on Microsofts web-site I can request a new CD, or verify if its a good number?

I will go there now and look around.


GX1_Man, thanks much for that tip.

Thanks to all, who have responded to my post .

[GX1_Man]

The magic jellybean worked like a charm! It downloaded fine and I now have the XP Pro CD key number.

Now what the heck do I do with it? Is there somewhere on Microsofts web-site I can request a new CD, or verify if its a good number?

Well, I think I would give Microsoft a call. Let's see how good their customer support is. ("Where do you want to go today?"

[Raptor]

Oh yeah, for a new XP Home disk and license, etc, and to install it he was wanting $160.00 or $180.00.

Fair, but you can do it yourself as well.

[Fordtruckmaniac]

I did check the number with the "valadation assistant" on Microsofts web-site and it said the product key is a good number.

[merlin_2]

Then ask them for a replacement disk........you have mislaid it<lost it>why spent the cash again!

[Fordtruckmaniac]

I called Microsoft today. Won't replace the disk. Have to provide some type of proof of your being the original purchaser of the software.

Oh well.

Thanks.

[merlin_2]

What proof.........hardly anybody has it.........put your foot down......and speak the monkey not the organ grinder........the manager.........>

[Fed]

W2k Rules!
(XP on steroids)
You will come back & thank me one day.  

You should be able to get a copy for next to nothing.