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Thread: Using valid, purchased product key for MS Office 'Academic' Professional 2003 on 'Small Business' 2003

  1. #1
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    Nov 2011
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    Using valid, purchased product key for MS Office 'Academic' Professional 2003 on 'Small Business' 2003

    Several years ago, I purchased MS Office Professional Edition 2003,ACADEMIC EDITION, which came with Business Contact Manager for MS Outlook (Disk #2).

    Around the same era, I purchased a laptop whose setup disks happen to include the same software, but as the "Small Business Edition," which can be activated upon purchasing rights to it. After computer setup, there was a 60-day trial icon for it on my desktop. Back then, I just uninstalled that entire suite and fresh-installed the same software, designated "Academic Edition," using my CD-software.

    Recently, this laptop's optical drive stopped reading CD's. It still reads DVD's just fine. I'm fairly 'puter-savvy, and have already tried so many things to try to restore usage of the CD-rom portion of the optical drive. I've tried deleting 'upper' and 'lower filters' from the registry, and cleaning the lens of the optical drive. I've actually given up, which doesn't come easy to me on things like this. The likelihood is that the optical drive needs to be replaced.

    So I resolved to do a clean-install of the system to see if that would make any difference. It did not.

    Now, I had already backed up my system using Paragon Backup & Restore, and so do have the option of returning to my advanced installation at any time, and thereby to a fully-installed and activated MS Office Suite (the "Academic Edition"). That, I did.

    Going 'back' to that last backup did not restore access to the CD-rom portion of my optical drive, and neither did a system clean-install.

    For various reasons I decided to settle for a clean-install, after all, hoping that perhaps I could activate the factory-installed MS Office 2003 "Small Business Edition" using my Product Key to my "Academic Edition" CD-software. So I returned to a clean-install.

    The 'factory'-installed MS Office 2003 Small Business Edition, so far, isn't accepting my purchased Product Key from my 'Education Edition' CD-software. What I have tried so far to do is insert the Product Key into a dialogue box that appears when I try to open a Doc file, *after* having deleted the following Registration registry keys:

    located in: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Registration
    Deleted: RefNum.{91CA0409-6000-11D3-8CFE-0150048383C9}

    and
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Registration\{91CA0409-6000-11D3-8CFE-0150048383C9}

    I even tried changing the ProductName and ProductNameBrand names listed in that key from "Business Edition" to "Professional Edition." Nuttin'


    Am I relegated to doing without an activated, already-installed MS Office 2003 suite in a clean-install just because 1) my optical drive will not read my CD-software to install it on the laptop, and 2) my Product Key is for the Academic "Professional" edition rather than for the "Small Business"? Is the Microsoft Office 2003 Suite really so close yet too far away?
    Last edited by Opey; 16-11-2011 at 01:34 PM.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Posts
    2

    Re: Using valid, purchased product key for MS Office 'Academic' Professional 2003 on 'Small Business' 2003

    [B]Well ... glory be!

    I found a solution to my dilemma, and I am so thrilled that I had to come back here and share it with everyone.

    Although I never did solve the CD-rom disappearing act, I did find a way to utilize my CD-software of the MS Office 2003 on a laptop that no longer reads anything other than DVD's.

    Now, I'd recently come to learn of making a slipstream of WinXP Pro with SP3 and add-ons using the Bart/RV Integrator steps, but I had completely spaced on the possibility of making an image file of the MSO2003 installation disc(s). I had never looked into placing such a file into a bootable USB memory stick.

    Before the idea could really congeal in my mind, I stumbled upon a blog page with a gold-mine of a little utility put out by Microsoft but for which Microsoft Product Support Services does not provide 'support.'

    The direct download: http://download.microsoft.com/downlo...olpanel_21.exe

    It's a FREE driver-based utility that creates a virtual CD drive, and that is designed to 'load' and 'play' ISO image files. It is awesome.

    I was able to install my own "Professional Academic" edition of MSO2003 straight-away!

    So until the actual optical drive actually gives out completely, I can live without playing, and ripping, music CD's with that laptop.

    I went looking for alternative, and free, software. Not much out there as far as I could tell. Winmount Free would be useful, but it won't load an ISO file over 25 MB in size, a lil' note not to be found anywhere until one actually tries to use the installed program. Otherwise, it does prove quite useful.

    Opey


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