SOLVED Windows 7 COE#

[john11139]

I have a Dell 760 that originally came with Vista on it. I had a Windows7 Home Preimum that I upgraded to. Worked fine. Now my hard drive went bad and I ordered a used 500 gb off Ebay that had been wiped. Installed it and Windows 7 but it wont activate. I used the original COE#. So IL borrowed a copy of Vista from a friend and reinstalled it, still would not activate using COE# When loading was done it gave me a number to call Microsoft, which I did, they gave me some new numbers to enter to activate it. (they were a different series than regular coe# ) but when I looked on for activation it still did not show activated. I went ahead and installed my Windows Home edition again but still can't activate it. I found a old Dell same model at a thrift store for $20. I bought it and installed the hard drive and it has windows 7 on it and shows activated but the only problem is it has only 80Gb drive and is almost full. Is there a way I can take the activation from the 80 gb and reinstall it on my 500 gb hard drive? Or is there a number I can call microsoft and reactivate it?

 

[KIngWhiskers]

You could clone the 80 Gb drive on to the 500 gb and that may do the trick.
Make sure to show all hidden and system files before cloning.
If it does not work you won't have lost anything.
If they are Seagate drives there is free cloning software from Seagate.
if not Seagate drives check out the drive manufactures website and sites like Major Geeks for help .

 

[john11139]

I tried every way I knew of except cloning. I installed Vista again and would still not activate. I have four old Dell's tried all their umbers and it wouldn't work. Finally seen a old computer on Facebook that showed its COE# entered that # number and took me to microsoft activation phone line said that number had been used but issued me a new number and after activating, re installed windows 7. Works fine. Thanks for the help.

 

[KIngWhiskers]

As they say there is more than one way of skinning a cat.
I had cloned genuine laptop Hdd to larger 500Gb or 1Tb and then upgraded them to 10 without any problem.
The trick is to show all the files hidden and System as some cloning software will not copy them and weird things occurred like Windows update not working.
Glad you got sorted.