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| Thread ID: 73467 | 2006-10-19 21:16:00 | Office 2003 | B.M. (505) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 492787 | 2006-10-19 21:16:00 | Ok let’s start by saying all the software is legitimate. :) Whilst setting up my new bitsa Computer I installed XP Professional & XP Office from their original retail disks. All worked fine and then I read Robert Luhn’s article page 66 Octobers PC World, exalting the virtues of a new “List” facility in XL 2003. Ahhh, thinks I, that would be handy for what I want, so off I go and purchase a copy of Office Basic 2003. Now, I realise that two similar programmes can fight so to try and avoid that I installed my new purchase on the “D” Drive whilst I played with it. Everything worked fine and I was very pleased with my efforts until I decided to install a DVD R/W in place of my old CD R/W. Blow me down if when I power up Office 2003 advises it needs to be activated! Nuts say I and ignore it. It’s already been activated and has been working fine. Then I open one of my XL Workbooks to update it but I can’t make any entries, the keyboard doesn’t work! So, I figure I have a hardware problem and change keyboards. However, when I restart I can enter my password ok so I figure the keyboard is now OK but I still can’t enter anything in my spreadsheet. I should say at this point that the spreadsheet I’m trying to update was formed under XP Office on the “C” drive, not XL 2003 on the “D” drive. Right I think, let’s deal with this authentication problem and see what happens. So I enter my 42 b….y numbers I was given when I first installed it and got the message that Authentication had failed. Tried again no luck. On to Microsoft and enter all my details and get a completely different set of numbers.? Authentication failed! Back to Microsoft and get an Operator this time and get another set of numbers. Authentication failed. So the poor prick at Microsoft (Sounded like Bin Laden) gets a right serve but he explains it was My Fault because I’d changed some hardware! What, I’ve got to go through this c..p every time I change some hardware? Yes Sir. You are joking! No sir. Ok, one way to fix this, UnInstall Office 2003! Right, that fixed that, except my spreadsheet now tells me it doesn’t have a programme to open it. The B….y uninstall programme for XL on the D drive has uninstalled XL on the C drive as well!! Geeeeeeeeeeeeeeeez now I have to reinstall Office XP and clean up the biggest registry mess you’ve ever seen. Now, the purpose of this post is twofold. 1: To warn those who haven’t already found out the hard way that if you going to use Office 2003 then don’t touch your Hardware. 2: To enquire if anybody has a work around to avoid this activation / Authentication process for us guys who have wasted our money on a Product that’s just too smart for its own good. |
B.M. (505) | ||
| 492788 | 2006-10-19 21:35:00 | Ok, so what do you want... a copy of Office XP or Office 2003? ;) | Greg (193) | ||
| 492789 | 2006-10-19 22:15:00 | Ok, so what do you want... a copy of Office XP or Office 2003? ;) :confused: I have a perfectly fine copy of both. What I want to know is how do I change hardware without having to beg Microsoft’s forgiveness? Given that even after entering three different authentications numbers provided by Microsoft, XL 2003 still wouldn’t work! :mad: |
B.M. (505) | ||
| 492790 | 2006-10-19 22:27:00 | Which is why I... um ok, nevermind. Sorry I can't help. :xmouth: | Greg (193) | ||
| 492791 | 2006-10-19 23:07:00 | "Office Basic 2003" is *supposed* to only be available "preinstalled" or bundled, so not sure how you got your version. www.microsoft.com But I can assure you that I have never had such a problem with several copies of Office 2003 Small Business Edition here, when doing such hardware changes. It's possible that the limitation exists only with the "Basic" edition, I cannot comment on that as its only supposed to be supplied as a bundle with a new PC, as far as I am aware? As it has restrictions on how it should be sold, perhaps it has similar restrictions on hardware changes. |
godfather (25) | ||
| 492792 | 2006-10-20 00:22:00 | Right, I'm off to see the nice man at the computer shop to see if he can shed any light on the problem . :cool: I would have thought that Bin Laden, (or whoever it was I was talking to on Microsoft's 0800 number), that issued the Authentication numbers (that didn't work) would have been onto it if there was a problem . I'm also a bit curious as to why each time I gave them the 54 digit number they requested, I got a different number back . :rolleyes: |
B.M. (505) | ||
| 492793 | 2006-10-20 07:16:00 | Problem solved! :thumbs: I got my money back & he got his disk back! The problem isn't new and he's as sick of it as I was! I really can see myself joining the F . . . Microsoft brigade! :mad: |
B.M. (505) | ||
| 492794 | 2006-10-20 10:40:00 | Now, the purpose of this post is twofold. 1: To warn those who haven’t already found out the hard way that if you going to use Office 2003 then don’t touch your Hardware. 2: To enquire if anybody has a work around to avoid this activation / Authentication process for us guys who have wasted our money on a Product that’s just too smart for its own good. Very strange indeed. Changing hardware shouldn't affect your activation with Office 2003 unless you change it big time. I change/add/remove hardware frequently and have never been asked to re-activate Office 2003. The way I understand it is it requires something like a motherboard, cpu, or HDD replacement to require re-activation. So something else is up here I think. Office does not like having two versions on the same computer, even on different drives (I am assuming they were both running under the same install of Windows). So this might have been a part of the problem. Uninstalling office 2003 would then cause problems with the previous version because the new version would have told Windows it was the version to use - when uninstalled Windows wouldn't know that the old version could still be used. You could have uninstalled just Excel XP and installed Excel 2003 and it should have worked reasonably well. Mike. |
Mike (15) | ||
| 492795 | 2006-10-20 19:30:00 | Office does not like having two versions on the same computer, even on different drives (I am assuming they were both running under the same install of Windows) . So this might have been a part of the problem . For versions prior to Office 2003 there is no problem as I have Office XP happily co-habitating with Office 97 . Maybe Office 2003 is a bit more selfish about sharing? I'll soon find out when I add it to the mix just to stir things up a bit but won't be able to fiddle around with hardware changes to test that theory, unfortunately . |
FoxyMX (5) | ||
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