Windows 7 - Product Key Does Not Match Current Windows SKU (Foreign product key?)

So short story, I work at a college tech site that fixes student and faculty computers. A foreign exchange student from Japan with a Sony Vaio (most likely from Japan as well) managed to get a virus on his computer and he was blocked off our network. Our policy is that we wipe and reinstall the OS to ensure that the virus is gone. However, we didn't have any Windows 7 Home Prem media CDs so I downloaded a Windows 7 Home Prem 32bit iso off of MSDN and burnt it to disk. However, when entering the product key given on the bottom of the laptop(and I've checked 3 times now to make sure it's correct), I get a:

"Product key does not match the current Windows SKU" error.

Why is this happening? Do I need a certain burnt iso (from Sony in Japan?) because of the laptop's foreign origins or is something else causing the problem here?

Yes, you need a Japanese iso, they have regional editions.