Proprietary Win 7 Installation

I have decided to make my Asus G72GX laptop a Mandriva machine. I don't really wish to give up some of my games so I'm testing out parallels for linux to solve my addiction problem. Installation of OS and Parallels 4 for Linux went silky smooth, now I'm getting an error with Windows 7 installation because it does not recognize the virtual machine as an Asus machine, and recovering from recovery images gives me an incorrect model error.

If anyone knows a work around so I can install my original OS I would very much appreciate the help.

Thank you in advance

 

Propriatory Windows 7 Installation

Hi,
I'm afraid you won't be able to use the Restore DVD from Asus to install Windows 7 as a Guest OS in Parallels Desktop 4 for Linux. You will need to purchase a Retail Version of Windows 7 to install it in Parallels Desktop.

The Restore DVD's are locked to a specific hardware configuration as part of the OEM Licencing Terms from Microsoft with Asus, and other OEM's. The OEM Licenced Versions of Windows 7 are linked to specific hardware profiles, of the particular systems that they come installed on, and can not be transferred to another system, whether that is a 'real' system or a Virtual System.

Even if you could get past the initial problems of it not recognising the virtual machine as an Asus machine, you would still not be able to activate Windows 7, as the hardware profile linked with your OEM Licence Key will no longer match up, and it will fail validation. In that case I'm not even sure that calling the Activation help line phone numbers will help sort this out as it's a clear violation of the OEM Licence Terms for Windows 7.

Jonathan.