I asked this question on another thread but it might get a better response here. I have a Dell with XP Pro on it. I had a problem one time and erased the hard drive along with the restore partition but did not have any problem reinstalling the os with the cd. If I purchase a Dell with XP Home edition on it can I install the XP Pro on it with this cd?
You might encounter some difficulty using a Windows operating system disk that was packaged with another Dell computer, although I am not 100% sure. I just reloaded a Dell with the supplied Windows disk (not the restore disk) and no activation was required; it might be designed to work only with the original computer it shipped with. You might wish to call Dell technical support and ask them if you can use your XP Pro disk with a new Dell, in terms of licensing and whether it will actually work.
I think it will work IF your XP Home set of disks is a separate WinXP disk + separate Dell resources disk + separate others. If your restore package is "5 disks with everything mixed together so that the only way to restore is to install all 5 disks", then maybe not. However, you could probably install WinXP Pro then go to Dell's support site and download the chipset, audio, video, modem, CD Burner drivers separately and install each.
Yes, you will be able to install WinXP Pro on your other machine. Be sure to separate your harddrive into partitions (at least 2) before you do so. Download all drivers necessary for your system along with other software that you need and store them in the second partition. This will make it easier to redo your OS partition later while your user files and install files remain safe in the second partition. BTW, you might be in violation of your license agreement if you have one XP Pro license but are running two systems with it at the same time. I just thought you should know that.
Does anyone know: is the dell security feature which only allows you to use it on a Dell on the hard drive or in the bios somewhere? Im thinking it must be in the bios. If your hard drive fails you should still be able to replace the hard drive and reinstall the os that comes with the machine shouldnt you?
Yes. Let me suggest that you get at least one other hard drive and use something like Acronis True Image to clone your HD(s) for backup. At some point, it will save you the time and annoyance of having to reinstall the OS from scratch.