New
#11
That technician is actually unqualified, in my opinion. Why would he upgrade it to Ultimate? Do you have a Windows 7 Home Premium Disk? Or a Recovery Drive? If not, you may want to request a Recovery Disk at Dell Here.
To properly analyse and solve problems with Activation and Validation, we need to see a full copy of the report produced by the MGADiag tool (download and save to desktop - http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?linkid=52012 )
Once saved, run the tool.
Click on the Continue button, which will produce the report.
To copy the report to your response, click on the Copy button in the tool (ignore any error messages at this point), and then paste (using either r-click/Paste, or Ctrl+V ) into your response.
- **in your own thread**, please
Please also state the Version and Edition of Windows quoted on your COA sticker (if you have one) on the case of your machine, but do NOT quote the Key on the sticker!
How to Tell - Home
Who is this technician who formatted the hard drive and installed Windows 7 Ultimate?
On whose authority did he do it?
Why didn't he provide a disc and a product key?
If Noel's advice proves that something is very wrong, your best bet will be to contact Dell and buy a recovery disc for your computer. Once installed you'll have no more activation problems.
Contact Dell Technical Support in your country. Give the service tag no. They would also require the name of the person who actually bought it (It can be your relative, friend or even you) so that they can verify it from their records. ( The verification is done instantaneously once you give the service tag)
Request for a OEM reinstall disk. They will send it free. ( If asked for the reason tell them a virus ate off your hard disk :) )
No OEM sends out free disks - unfortunately - They all will charge a handling fee, which can be excessive for some OEM's (Acer/Dixons wanted to charge me £50 for my set! - you can imagine what I said to that)
Dell sends it free (depending upon the warranty status). US residents have to just fill up the media request form here Dell - Support and submit online.
In other countries you just contact Dell Technical Support and give all relevant details. They will courier the disk to you. (If asked to take it to any DELL authorised Service Center/ Franchisee Service agency just tell them politely you will be hard put to do it and you will appreciate if it is couriered to you and you will take care of the clean install)
(In India, I just contacted Dell Technical Support (located at New Delhi) and told them that I am unable to restore my lappie (purchased in USA by my daughter) to factory condition with the recovery partition and the next day a DELL Guy from Bangalore DELL HQ rang me up to confirm my address to courier the OEM Reinstall Disk.)
Last edited by jumanji; 19 Feb 2012 at 12:19. Reason: warranty status condition included.
That's certainly not been the experience here in the UK - even in warranty, if memory serves me right.
That page exists in the US site, but not the UK/Europe one - and I can't find a similar one either, or any mention of the ability to even purchase a set (although I'm sure it's there somewhere).
In my dealings with Dell, I've had a motherboard replaced, RAM replaced and a set of recovery discs all free of charge as the computer was covered by a two-year parts and labour warranty.
It never hurts to ask and Dell do seem to provide better backup than retailers such as PC World.