Win 7: How to find OS product key in BIOS?

Hello.
My friend came to me looking for help with formatting his old laptop (ASUS A52J).

I downloaded Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder to find out the product key, and then formatted the hdd.
We re-installed the OS (Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit) and tried to activate it with the key. Sadly the key didn't work.

I figured that they key in BIOS would do the trick, so I downloaded and installed RWEverything and launched it. I went to 'ACPI Tables' but the 'MSDM' tab was missing. (By the way, why is it missing?) So I can't find the key using RWEverything. (Unless I'm doing something wrong?)

Now I wonder if anyone knows of any other way to extract the OS key from BIOS?
Thanks in advance. =)

Hello and sorry for the wait - mate the only way that I know of fixing this by phoning Microsoft and quoting the product key - if you get lucky you might be able to get them to let you activate the machine or just get an OEM or if you have the activation code on a sticker on that machine then use this
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/219487-clean-reinstall-factory-oem-windows-7-a.html borrow a friends installation disk and use the ie.cfg removal tool to get the original version n that machine (see this in the tutorial) .

See this http://lifehacker.com/5438005/eicfg-removal-utility-lets-you-use-any-product-key-with-your-windows-7-disc but it MUST be the original version that was installed on that machine. So if for example it was Home Premium then you must only use Home Premium

Windows 7 Product Keys are not stored in the BIOS - the only 'personal' Key is on the COA sticker on the machine's case (or possibly inside the battery compartment)
It's likely that the Key you found with the Keyfinder is an OEM_SLP Key - which is only valid when used with the proper manufacturer's Recovery media.

Yep Noel that's why I suggested the tutorial from Greg as I do not like to go into lengthy answers or delve into what anyone can afford I just thought if he had the code on the sticker and could borrow a friends or relative's 7 disk he could go that way as it is fiddly but would save an awful lot of money for him.

This is a late post, but to help out anyone else that stumbles upon this thread here's a list of software that can find the product key. I've made a distinction between software that retrieves the product key from the registry and software that retrieves the product key from the BIOS (e.g. laptops with OEM installation).

Product key from registry:

• Magical Jellybean Key Finder
• Belarc Advisor
• Piriform Speccy
• Windows Product Key Finder Pro
• LicenceCrawler
• SoftKey Revealer
• Product Key Decryptor (the command line version is called Windows License Key Dump)
• WinKeyFinder
• Win Product Key Viewer

Product key from BIOS:

• NeoSmart Technologies Windows OEM Product Key Tool

Product key from both registry and BIOS in one list/report:

• NirSoft ProduKey
• One Up Ltd. Recover Keys