xp activation

[chrbb]

Just replaced the psu on a friends computer started it up and needed to activate xp. I thought it only needed activating after a motherboard change not a psu. Am I right?

[PeterW]

Pretty much yes, a PSU change on its own cannot trigger the need for a reactivation. However if the faulty or new psu affected some of the other components in some way it may cause this behavior.

[chrbb]

Well it's reactivated and running, further investigation shows some folders in windows folder dated year 2013 (which is perhaps why it needed reactivating) , so maybe psu failing corrupted some files or cmos battery duff. I'll let it run for a while then restart several times and see what happens!

[kestrel1]

Check that the date is correct in Windows & check it in the BIOS.

[chrbb]

Run date in command and checked bios both show todays date. Seems to be working ok, restarted it a couple of times no problems.

[kestrel1]

Maybe it was just an error on those folders or they got created when the date was set wrong on the machine.