Software: Open letter to Microsoft - your product does not work

Sirs

I have genuine windows xp professional.

It has been validated on a desktop PC.

Following a mainboard fault, the hard disk has been swapped into a temporary replacement PC with a different model board and chip.

Your product demands that it be reactivated despite the fact that it has been used, properly and legally, for some years.

The reactivation does not work.

I have tried with both IE and Firefox, having installed the plug-ins you demand.

When I turn on the PC it asks if I want to re-activate. If say yes, it produces an empty window. If I say now, it nags and asks if I want to reactivate and then it returns an empty window. If I follow the Start > ... System Tools > Activate links, it returns and empty window.

In each case, the empty window hangs.

It is supposed to include, amongst other things, contact information to be used if on-line reactivation

The system demands that it must be activated no later than tomorrow with unspecified consequences.

I have tried writing to service@microsoft.com, the address given on the activation page at your website (http://www.microsoft.com/genuine/downloads/nonGenuine.aspx?displaylang=en&Error=1&PartnerID=107&sGuid=be2ae34b-c425-48c3-adc4-a0deaa7445de) and the mail is returned because the address is not valid.

I have therefore taken all steps required by you and all reasonable steps to try to contact you.

Please IMMEDIATELY provide me with a way to reactivate Windows and to ensure that this problem does not happen again when the disk is put into another PC which will happen when my new Desktop machine arrives.

This is NOT a support request. Your product is not working. That's not support, it's a defective product.

Yours faithfully

Nigel Morris-Cotterill