Hi everyone, New here and new at this. Thanks for all the great info - I'm reading stickies and struggling with some basic concepts. Sorry for the dumb questions ahead of time. I bought two Windows 7 Premium upgrade licenses for our two main machines. Haven't gotten around to installing but I have them. I also have an older Dell 8400 which has been running one of the Win7 RCs on it for a while, so I know it works. A friend order a newer Dell a few months ago and got a (Dell) Win7 Upgrade disk and gave (well... loaned) it to me. He's in no hurry to upgrade, if at all. The disk has a product key. First bank of questions: 1- Can I use the disk (and product key) to install Win7 on the old Dell (Dell A09 Phoenix BIOS dated 7/7/06?) 2- If I do so, can I still use the same disk to upgrade his very new (would it be preactivated?) machine? If the answer to either of these is 'no', and if I wanted to (for learning purposes! ) pursue flashing my BIOS (I've already downloaded it), could someone please point me to the correct part of the appropriate sticky where the steps are defined? This is where I'm stumbling trying to understand SLICs CERTs and KEYs. I'm not sure which I have and which I need given that I have a Dell upgrade disk and this is a Dell machine. Thanks in advance!
The Dell 8400 doesn't have a slic table so you won't be able to mod that bios. The DVD you got will probably have a SLP OEM key to use with a SLIC2.1 bios in the newer dell so i doubt it would work either! Probably not the news you were looking for sorry
I don't believe those upgrade discs use SLP keys. I believe they're essentially OEM discs with accompanying OEM keys you enter yourself. The key is going to get tied to one computer, so no, you shouldn't use that if your friend plans to use it on his computer. And if you use the disc, it's probably going to install the OEM version of the software, which you're probably not going to want on your own computer. You shouldn't even use the disc to install even if you might, say, go buy your own version in a week. So the answers to your questions are: (1) Technically, maybe (2) No
Technically Yes, Legally no. Your computer thought without slic 2.1, can be activated with COA, that came with upgrade disk, his computer with slic 2.1, will be activating using it, regardless does that disk contain any key, cert, if it don't, just insert it in after installation.
Every key that Dell, and other royalty oem, gave to you, be it on Laptop, Desktop, Upgrade disk, is unique, and can be activated. There is different group of OEM windows product ID, OEM SLP, are keys that came installed in your Dell computers, but not the keys pasted on your housing, what is pasted there belong to another group, i think is call oem, it differ from keys sold outside, which by the way is call system builder, those name are from Microsoft genuine advantage tool. Till Microsoft decided to make it a requirement to have valid slp before you can activate oem keys, those will work on normal computers.
Thanks for the all replies! Much appreciated! This Dell upgrade disk (which he had to apply for, and received in the mail) looks similar to my two retail upgrade disks, and the key doesn't look in any way like a generic Dell OEM key. So, if his machine has SLIC2.1 (it's only a couple of months old) then, when we upgrade him, will or will we not have to actually enter the key on this upgrade disk sticker? Has anyone actually ever done this with these after-the-purchase upgrade disks that were promised for free if you bought a system? It seems like my best bet (if I can't use his key) is to go the loader route. I've flashed BIOSs before but this doesn't sound too promising, based on your comments. If I use a loader, can I use one of my retail upgrade disks as the Windows 7 source? Or am I significantly better off downloading one of the full versions and using that? Thanks again for your patience and help!
I had a similar situation. New (SLIC 2.1) Dell laptop, and a much older (SLIC 2.0) Dell desktop. I ordered the Win7 upgrade for the laptop but installed it on the desktop, with supplied key. Because laptop has SLIC 2.1 I grabbed the Dell cert + SLP key and installed Win 7 on laptop. Simples...
Legal, do not kid yourself. You have a single licence (free upgrade that is) installed on 2 machines. So legaly you are NOT LEGAL (but who cares?) sebus
I successfully modded the Dell Dimension 8400 with a slic 2.1 table, I used the phoenix mod tool v1.29 and using the ssv2 method it added the slic table, and it shows up on rw everything in acpi table. I am not sure where to send this file though for other people who need it. The system has p4 3.0ghz 2gb ram, and I upgraded gfx card to ATI HD 5450 which runs aero and uses very little power.
I went the loader route (Daz) and it worked fine (and continues to work fine). I wouldn't mind trying a BIOS mod though if you feel inclined to share.
edlivian and the sultan, can you pm or re-posted it in the forum? Many thanks in advance and desperately in need for upgrading my 8400.
I have a very old dell laptop latitude D800 bought in 2003. Upgrade memory to 2G and also the hard drive to 320G, installed win 7 ultimate and activated with Daz loader. it works perfect. very fast. Of course, I only use it for browsing, downloading and occasionally watch movie and use excel and word.
Sorry for bumping this old thread... Just wanted to say I have already upgraded a bunch of Dell's, Desktops, Laptops and Notebooks and so far the only real problem I have found when upgraded from XP is normally the Video chip-set gets the wrong driver loaded by Windows and often the audio needs help in Device Manager as well. Otherwise I stick to 32 bit for the older models and most do pretty well. The biggest pain for me is Win7 not detecting the correct video display driver, and this often leads to a hunt on google to find a driver and then one has to fight with device manager to force the driver on Windows. I have not done any Dells with Vista, I think Dell was still using XP a few months ago if Ii am not mistaken.