Sheesh, I didn't mean to start an XP war! My comment was just based on my purely subjective decision that I'm d@mned if I'm going to go cap in hand to Microsoft every time I want to reinstall from scratch (or have a major upgrade). I loathe piracy, but this 'product activation' thing stinks. I wonder how long XP activation will be supported once MS decide they want us all to use their next operating system? But this is turning into an anti-MS rant, and is WAY off topic. Sorry. John