I have a genuine valid copy of Windows XP home...complete with OEM system recovery discs and am the original owner...trying to reinstall O/S (again and again for the last few weeks!!!) and now getting that "cannot validate" error message...finally gave up and just turned on auto-updates...only took a few minutes for auto-update to run and that solved the problem with validation and updating for me... today anyway...
have been trying to recover O/S for several weeks... kept getting "installation failure...0x80070005" and that O/S was partially updated and may be unstable...(that part was sure right)....when trying to install SP2 update...always happened at the very end of the install...solved that by downloading and installing the updates in chronological order thru the custom install option and not jumping to SP2 even though Microsoft update said computer was ready for it...SP2 may be a cumulative update but it only installed sucessfully when I went thru updates in order...didn't find the "Microsoft work-around" fix till later...
and then there is another recent issue with file folders view when reinstalling XP...hope Microsoft fixes this soon...I'm almost old as dirt and need the picture icons to see better(no, I like the resolution and such set where I have it so don't even go there)...wish it would just work like it used to without having to change them manually...
spending more time trying to get clean install O/S than getting to use computer
didn't think I needed an IT education just to use the damn thing and keep it running
not looking forward to Windows Vista anymore...by the time you get the bugs out... I will be connecting thru a psychic from the great beyond....lmao...
frustrated and breathing fire,
komodo dragon
