A 1 in 6 Chance

December 17, 2004 9:07 AM

BarelyCompetentAdminFilter: I have 6 copies of MS Office 2003 installed on 6 computers at work. One computer went kaput and has been replaced. How do I determine which copy of Office to put on it?
posted by willpie to computers & internet (5 comments total)

Maybe look at the serial #s of the other 5, and figure out which one is left?
posted by cmonkey at 9:22 AM on December 17, 2004

And then, when you expand, contact Microsoft about buying a group license so that you (legally) install to all your computers from one disk, and never have to deal with this problem again.
posted by bingo at 9:40 AM on December 17, 2004

Nah, that won't work because once you enter the serial number you can't retrieve it. I don't have a copy in front of me, but is the Product ID different for each install? And if it is, is that something that can be traced to the package? The product ID is definitely retrievable from the Help -> about screen.

There is a lot of information that will probably help in the registry (i am looking at HKLM\software\microsoft\office\11.0\registration\{stringofnumbersandletters}\. Maybe something in there can be converted back into the registration key, but I don't know how to do it.
posted by bDiddy at 9:46 AM on December 17, 2004

If you want to go the process-of-elimination route, it looks like the latest beta of keyfinder may be what you're looking for. I've used the stable version for installations of Office XP and it's worked every time. YMMV
posted by schustafa at 9:55 AM on December 17, 2004

Yay Keyfinder! Thanks!
posted by willpie at 10:24 AM on December 17, 2004