breadandbubbles: Did you ever get an answer about your missing wpa.bak file. I have run into a similar problem with trying reinstall win xp hm and then needing to reativate windows but i am also missing wpa.bak file from system32 folder but i do have the origianl copy of wpa.dbl. I am wondering if anyone knows if the workaraound for activation will still work with only my original copy of the wpa.dbl and no wpa.bak. please let me know