I'm a white box builder and built my own rig from scratch a few weeks ago.
Here's the problem. After building the machine, installing vista home premium and activating it, etc etc etc, I had a driver issue that needed me to format the machine and reinstall everything.
Vista Activated again, and all's cool. Untill earlier today. I had to download MS DirectX 9.c for an old Windows 98 machine I have lying about that isn't connected to the net. So, I plodded along to the MS DirectX site and they wanted me to click on the Validation Required button to continue with my download. I did, I let the IE7 install the active X control for the MS Geniune validation tool thing. The validation result however stated that my copy of Vista was not Activated.
I was sure I had activated it, so I ran the command prompt and typed "slui" and low and behold, the windows activation screen said that activation had already been successful.
I thought nothing of it thinking the website must have had a buggy moment and downloaded DX from another machine. Until that is I restarted my Vista machine and as the desktop came up I get a warning message titled "Windows Aero is not working" saying:
"This copy of Microsoft Windows is not geniune.
To use all Microsoft Windows features, such as the Windows Aero colour scheme and it's associated visual elements; get the latest updates; and recieve product support, your copy of Microsoft Windows must be validated as genuine.
Go online and resolve now"
I'm not being funny, but now all those features don't work, but have done in the past. I've downloaded updates all the time before today. No-one else has ever seen my Product Key so theft of my licence has simply not been possible. This all came about since I ran that Active X Genuine Validation tool.
I went to click on the "resolve now" link, followed the instructions to become validated and same as from using the active x genuine tool, I get to a page saying
"
Windows must be activated before validation can determine if this copy of Windows is genuine.
Access to the latest updates, all available features, and product support is reserved for customers running genuine Microsoft software. Until you activate and validate Windows, certain features of Windows Vista may be disabled.
"
Not a happy bunny as this is a ligit copy of Vista. So, How do I resolve? Windows knows it's activated, your MS servers don't. suggestions?
