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Multi Manufacturer Pre-Activation


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Now some manufacturers are intentionally creating new OEMBIOS.* sets to distinguish XP product lines. You may be mistakenly thinking that your HEDY OEMBIOS set is good for all HEDY's when in it may only cover a limited set.

This is what i expected all along, this is the exact reason why i always try to use oembios files dated 2001 or so (XP without Service Pack)

In my experiences the "old" files most of the time do work on newer PC's but new (SP2) oembios files sometimes refuse to work on old PC's

Looks like the Manufactures/Microsoft have acknowledged the "flaw" in the SLP Preacvtivation are are trying to tighten the usability to use 1 set of oembios files for 1 model etc etc.

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@ Bezalel, FreeStyler, Severach,

I'll explain what I was doing, which should answer most of your questions. :)

I was making two OEM Multi-Boot disks, one for Home and one for Pro. Each image included OEMBIOS set, the PID for that set or the Microsoft System Builder PID, oemlogo, info, wallpapers and themes [if available] :)

As I added each image to the disk, I tested it in VirtualPC. Which was setup to dual boot, and had the BIOS modifed with the SLP for that OEM. I know its never a great idea to test two different things at the same time, so any problems I found i.e. PID failing, wallpaper/theme not displaying I noted down so I could look i to it later and continued on with the next install.

All was fine till I tried the Hedy set. Both Home and Pro images installed fine, except the Home preactivated but Pro didn't. Which was strange as the hardware/BIOS were indentical [Dual Boot VirtualPC] I rebuilt the Pro image making sure I used the correct OEMBIOS set and installed it again, with the same results.

Now my Multi-Boot disks are complete [i think] :whistle:

I'm going to test them on a real system. I'll start with the Hedy installs and report back.

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NEC added

BTW, did you know the HP & COMPAQ oembios files are 100% identical?

at least mine are, (expanded) oembios.bin both have this MD5 value "3598a33c8de2e13bb3f5dbd22bc8cb76"

strange thing however is both systems have different SLP strings eg: "Hewlett-Packard" and "COMPAQ"

Edited by FreeStyler
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BTW, did you know the HP & COMPAQ oembios files are 100% identical?

at least mine are, (expanded) oembios.bin both have this MD5 value "3598a33c8de2e13bb3f5dbd22bc8cb76"

strange thing however is both systems have different SLP strings eg: "Hewlett-Packard" and "COMPAQ"

An OEM can have multiple SLP strings in their OEMBIOS files. This allows them to use a single image for multiple product lines.

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had the BIOS modifed with the SLP for that OEM

How are you going about this? Are you using one of the dos based apps like DMI.exe, etc?

I have M$'s VirtualPC 2004, but also have the older non M$ version..which one will i need installed and if you, or anyone else, can explain the process to patch the Virtual PC bios to test my ISO's i would appreciate it.

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had the BIOS modifed with the SLP for that OEM

How are you going about this? Are you using one of the dos based apps like DMI.exe, etc?

I have M$'s VirtualPC 2004, but also have the older non M$ version..which one will i need installed and if you, or anyone else, can explain the process to patch the Virtual PC bios to test my ISO's i would appreciate it.

with MS Virtual PC you can try this approach

- MMTool 2.22.1(google is your friend)

- hex-editor / ultraedit

- resource hacker

  • Open Resource hacker and extract BIOS resource, the 256kb file extracted is the bios to be edited, rename it to bios.rom
  • next, open mmtool "powertool" and open that bios.rom, select dmi and extract it to dmi.rom
  • Open it with UltraEdit and replace the original contents, like: "Mircrosoft Corporation" , "Virtual Machine" etc etc, with the ones of your choice, save
  • In mmtool use the replace function to replace the DMI with the just saved dmi.rom - save
  • In resource Hacker replace BIOS, 13500 resource with the bios file saved in the step above ("BIOS, 13500, 1033")
  • save and test ;)

Edited by FreeStyler
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OK Guys,

I tested the Hedy OEMBIOS set in both Home and Pro on my test box, and both activated, I tried it on Virtual PC and again the Pro failed. So I'm guessing its a Virtual PC thing. :blushing:

@ FreeStyler,

Thanks for the NEC files, and for passing on the Virtual PC info. :)

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OK Guys,

I tested the Hedy OEMBIOS set in both Home and Pro on my test box, and both activated, I tried it on Virtual PC and again the Pro failed. So I'm guessing its a Virtual PC thing. :blushing:

@ FreeStyler,

Thanks for the NEC files, and for passing on the Virtual PC info. :)

I got HEDY working, BIOS SLP string should read: HEDYCOMPUTER

My modded Virtual PC bios reads like this:

System Manufacturer: LEGEND DragonIBM CORPORATIONHewlett-PackardFounder PCAcerSystem

BIOS Vendor: CompaqTSINGHUA TONGFANG COMPUTERHEDYCOMPUTERFUJITSU-PCTCL123

Chasis Vendor: MEDIONPCTOSHIBA

All SLP BIOS strings above confirmed working with the corresponding vendor OEMBIOS files, my modded Virtual PC Bios rom can be found in the attachment ;)

vpcbios.zip

Edited by FreeStyler
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In my experiences the "old" files most of the time do work on newer PC's but new (SP2) oembios files sometimes refuse to work on old PC's

This may be true on occasion but is not true in general. Dell has at least 3 OEMBIOS packs. This is how I name them with the CRC-32 of the OEMBIOS.BIN file in the name. Any CD's I generate also have both the SLP and the CRC32 printed on them. Noobs use the SLP+Nickname and I use the CRC32 to know what the coverage is.

Dell-0C706A10-Inspiron1000(SiS-2200Mhz)

Dell-263CE3FB-Common

Dell-5D93572F-New

Common covers most systems up to Pentium 4 2.5Ghz. New covers most systems from 2.0Ghz and beyond. Neither New nor Common would preactivate on the Inspiron and there are many >2.0Ghz machines that will preactivate with New but not not with Common.

BTW, did you know the HP & COMPAQ oembios files are 100% identical?

at least mine are

The two on RapidShare are. Putting the CRC32 or MD5 in the name or description would allow you and all the rest of us to identify the dups. I'm using CRC32 myself because it keeps the names shorter and is sufficient until MS decides to generate OEMBIOS.BIN files that have different contents but the same CRC's. They won't do that even when baited because the switch to MD5 or better is trivial.

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with MS Virtual PC you can try this approach

- MMTool 2.22.1(google is your friend)

- hex-editor / ultraedit

- resource hacker

  • Open Resource hacker and extract BIOS resource, the 256kb file extracted is the bios to be edited, rename it to bios.rom
  • next, open mmtool "powertool" and open that bios.rom, select dmi and extract it to dmi.rom
  • Open it with UltraEdit and replace the original contents, like: "Mircrosoft Corporation" , "Virtual Machine" etc etc, with the ones of your choice, save
  • In mmtool use the replace function to replace the DMI with the just saved dmi.rom - save
  • In resource Hacker replace BIOS, 13500 resource with the bios file saved in the step above ("BIOS, 13500, 1033")
  • save and test ;)

@FreeStyler

Nice work with modded Virtual PC bios.

I'm using M$ Virtual Server 2005 R2 and would like to achieve same mods.

Step 3 use hexeditor to change "Microsoft Corporation" string. I would like to replace with a string (# lengh).

could i add / remove spaces when hexediting ?

I can PM you DMI.ROM file if you would like to hexedit it and attach it on the board?

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