Updating Compaq OEM XP Home to XP Pro Failure

Howdy,
Today I was trying to upgrade a Compaq Presario machine that came
preinstalled with XP Home to XP Pro. I booted into Home and put the
Pro disk in, ran the compatibility wizard and all came back fine. No
incompatibilities were detected. So I continued with the upgrade. It
was copying files and all looked great. It then rebooted to boot into
the newly installed XP Pro environment. It displayed the loading
Windows XP screen and then suddenly reboots. It would continue to do
this over and over again. If I attempt to boot into Safe Mode an error
message comes up saying that Setup can not complete in safe mode and
reboots me into another endless cycles of loading screens and reboots.
I do however get into a graphical background in safe mode.

I talked to tech support at HP and they first claimed that it was
impossible to upgrade Home to Pro and told me that I should just
reformat and perform a clean install. Then after complaining about how
it seemed ridiculous that I couldn't upgrade and that I didn't want to
reformat completely they said, "Well I guess we could try the work
around." They then told me to try and download and install the drivers
for my motherboard chipset and refered me to a download page at ATI.

So two questions arise... First off, how can I install these drivers
(in an exe package) through the recovery console because this is all I
currently have access to. And secondly has anyone else had any
experience with this type of problem and can guide me in the right
direction on how to fix this problem without reformatting and
performing a clean install.

There must be a way to do this correctly...

Thanks in advance!

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: XP Home --> Pro upgrade
    ... management features are getting activated behind the screensaver? ... I wanted to do the upgrade to Pro for some time on this machine. ... Otherwise I'm going to have to go back to the factory install ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: XP Home --> Pro upgrade
    ... management features are getting activated behind the screensaver? ... I wanted to do the upgrade to Pro for some time on this machine. ... Otherwise I'm going to have to go back to the factory install ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: upgrade XP home to XP pro
    ... How do I put XP pro onto the inherited machine? ... Will it upgrade if I insert the XP Pro disk and run the install program or must I reformat the hard drive on the inherited machine? ... An OEM license is permanently bound to the computer on which it was originally installed, and may never be legitimately transferred to a new computer. ... WinXP is designed to install and upgrade the existing operating system while simultaneously preserving your applications and data, and translating as many personalized settings as possible. ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.newusers)
  • Re: Activation Question
    ... As long as you're upgrading from Home, you can purchase the upgrade version. ... Per user Group Policy Restrictions for XP Home and XP Pro ... Here is an important question - do I need to purchase the FULL retail package or can I purchase the UPGRADE retail package. ... >> It sounds like you bought an OEM version which will only do a clean install. ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics)
  • Re: upgrading to xp pro from xp home
    ... the XP Pro disc will give you the option to upgrade ... >> Should be the same for Home and Pro, but with Sony you necver know. ... All my programing came on sony disks. ... >>>>can i just install it over top of my current programing as an install. ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.mediacenter)
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