Not to beat this to death but something ocurred to me when I kept thinking about OEM. If you bought a copy of Windows and when you called Microsoft support and gave them the serial number they said "That's OEM, we won't support it," that I can understand.You can certainly buy Windows from a discounter that was originally sold to an OEM like IBM or Micron. Somewhere on the packaging it should say , I think the language Microsoft uses is something like "For sale only with a new PC." If that's on the shrinkwrap or a sticker, it could well have been removed though. Microsoft would still have a record of who they sold it to originally. They have no obligation to support it and I'm sure it's against company policy though you might get a nice rep who might help out for a mnior issue. Really though it's the OEM's responsibility and if you didn't buy the OEM hardware, you're out of luck. Sorry if I'm saying something you already know. It's just the only scenario I can figure out. If you walked into CompUSA or BestBuy and picked it up for full retail then I'd like to know so I can contact Microsoft myself and clarify their support policies since I don't want to end up in a similar situation.

"Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance." - H. L. Mencken