Original Title: OEM Windows XP Home SP3 upgrade to XP Pro
Here is a compilation of posts from another forum regarding
my problem:
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I'm trying to upgrade an OEM Windows XP Home Sp3 system to
Windows XP Pro.(There are a couple of features in Pro
that are not available in Home that I now need: (1) Offline Files and
(2) a freely available add-on to Onenote 2007,Top2onenote, requires Pro).
I do not want a clean install but an upgrade. I purchased a Windows XP Pro
upgrade CD over Ebay which turned out to be Windows XP Pro
Gold (v2002).I'm sure its genuine for the following reasons:
It was listed as an upgrade, but the CD is not labeled "Upgrade".
It looks very genuine with all the Microsoft holography.
It came in the standard Windows XP packaging (minus the box),
and it was sealed.
The volume label for the CD is WXPFPP_EN.From the Internet,
that is Windows XP Pro RTM (Gold) Retail !!!!
Here are the things I tried initially.
1) I tried to upgrade to Pro from the purchased CD. It immediately
refused to upgrade stating the upgrade OS (Pro) was older than the
installed OS (Home)..
2) I read up on slipstreaming. Slipstreaming allows one to incorporate
a service pack with an earlier version of an OS. I created an
image of a slipstreamed upgrade XP Pro SP3 CD using Nlite (and
later Autostreamer, but it made no difference) from the purchased CD
and a file containing SP3.
After burning the CD and starting the upgrade
installation (from Windows), the upgrade process
proceeds through "Collecting Information",
"Dynamic Update", and "Preparing Installation" with
no problems. My machine rebooted and returned to
"Preparing Installation". A progress bar titled "Progress"
quickly filled to about 90% and the system hung
at that point for about 15 minutes.
Next, I received the following error:
Setup cannot set the required Windows XP configuration
information. This indicates an internal setup error.
This is where I'm stuck. I had to quit Setup at this point.
My hard drive was unbootable and I had to restore a backup.
3) Just for the heck of it, I formatted my hard disk and
reinstalled my original OEM XP Home SP3 OS (clean, no user files).
I immediately used my slipstreamed XP Pro CD to attempt an
upgrade to XP Pro and IT WORKED!!! I need to discover why the
clean XP Home OS successfully upgraded to XP Pro but my preexisting
(with user files,drivers, etc.) XP Home OS will not upgrade
successfully to XP Pro.
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From another post:
Again, today I installed a fresh copy of OEM Windows XP Home Sp3.
I followed that with an installation of all essential and add-on
drivers (essentially all my original version drivers). Next, I
configured a network connection and firewall. With this setup,
I ran the XP Pro slipstreamed SP3 CD. The upgrade to XP Pro was
successful (even though the upgrade did not configure my graphics
card correctly). I guess my current problem is either the registry,
the WINDOWS folder, or some user file or setting.
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From another post:
I've made a file and folder backup of the C:\Windows folder
on my preexisting system (OEM XP Home Sp3). I've also made a
separate backup of the "System State" on my preexisting system.
These are in addition to my full image backup of the preexisting
system from a month ago.
I've made an image backup of my minimal system (Fresh OEM XP Home
SP3 with all original drivers installed plus a configured network
connection, and a configured firewall). This system will upgrade
successfully to XP Pro with the slipstreamed XP Pro SP3 CD.
Experiment 1:
I restored my minimal system. I then restored the C:/Windows folder
and the System State from the preexisting system backup. A bootup
was successful (with a minor irritant). I had to activate Windows.
Next, I tried the upgrade with the slipstreamed XP Pro. It paused
at the same place during the upgrade and gave the same error as before:
Setup cannot set the required Windows XP configuration information.
This indicates an internal setup error.
Experiment 2:
I restored my minimal system. I then restored only the System State
from the preexisting system backup. After bootup I was asked to
activate Windows, but answering yes to the question would log me off
the system. I could not get logged in to try the XP Pro upgrade.
Experiment 3:
I restored my minimal system. I then restored only the C:/Windows
folder from the preexisting system backup. Again, as in Experiment 1,
the upgrade failed at the same point with the same error message.
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Before Experiment 3, I hoped that Experiment 3 would succeed so I
could conclude I had a registry problem. I'm not so sure now.
I don't know what to try next. Taking the minimal system and reinstalling
my user files is not an option as my hard disk has over 200GB of
programs!!! If I restore all the files and folders from my preexisting
backup I would still have to restore a reliable System State (read registry).
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Sorry for the length! If anyone has any ideas I'd appreciate replies.
Thanks,
