Hi i,m not sure where to post this.my question is iv,ed made many ghost images of 98se which u can easily use on any pc ,cause driver detections happen after reboot.now heres the thing ived made plenty of nortons ghost images of xp but i cant use them on different pcs cause i get the blue screen and usually a video driver issue .is this a mbr problem or can i stop detections?i just wantta make a ghost image i can transfer to any box i use nortons ghost 2003.thx you msfn rocks. B)

Edited September 15, 200619 yr by wizardofwindows

This is Microsoft's anti-piracy at work. If you have a lot a PC's that have the same motherboard etc. you can use a Ghost image. If you are trying to put that image on several DIFFERENT PC's then it will not work.

You need to purchase a license key for each machine you Ghost to.

If you are a system builder and buy XP in 3 or 10 packs, it comes with a Sysprep CD that you can run before imaging that will ask for a new key # and the user name when you restore.

If you are asking for help with piracy of XP you will find NO HELP on this forum.

no iam not a pirate id use the same key .

You'll need to SysPrep the PC before creating the image, or else all computers receiving the image will share the same Security Identifier (SID), resulting in all kinds of problems. Googling for "sysprep ghost" should return plenty of info. Of course, if you do not posess enough Windows XP and Ghost licenses for all computers that will be deployed using this image, you are in violation of your license agreements.

thx u i found my answers here.ghost it all makes sense now.a interesting read.

If you are using the same key I have to assume you are working for a large company or school ????

The BSOD is more to do with incompatible HAL than SIDs and product keys.

The BSOD is more to do with incompatible HAL than SIDs and product keys.

Very likely, yes, but that problem would also be solved by SysPrep'ing the image.

Very likely, yes, but that problem would also be solved by SysPrep'ing the image.

That all depends upon what HAL is on the original machine and what HAL should be installed on the traget systems.

Another possibility is that the mass storage drivers are incorrect. Sysprep can also take care of this.