whats up with reinstalling Vista

I decided to rearange my HDDs to move my older ones to a secondary computer, and keep the big new on on my main machine. I got rid of my Raid0 (held Vista previously) to make a Raid1 on the new machine, and got rid of my older HDD to hold media files on the new machine (used the have XP).

with all this moving around I decided that this was a good time to do a clean install of Vista64.

The problem is that Vista is saying my key is invalid because it only works with a previous version of windows installed? It didn't say this before when I had a dual boot setup. so what do I do? install XP, then install Vista over it? doesn't sound clean to me. I don't want to dual boot it; both partitions have data on them I want to keep, and I was almost never using XP before and don't want to bother with the OS chaoice at startup.

between this, all the problems I've had getting XP MCE to install properly, and the hassles I've had with unfinished games I purchased, I'm starting to think the best way to go is use pirated software. its lots less hassle, and I get treated like a pirate even when I decide to do the "right" thing.

Wow, what a pain in the a$$, guess I'll have to reinstall everything AGAIN.
piracy and Linux are looking better and better.

Thanks for the info, I was thinking of something similar, but it nice to know exactly how to proceed.

no, you cant do a clean install anymore. thats the whole point. you used to be ably to, but now you cant validate it if you do.

I'm whinning that they changed the rules after the fact.

Also, I didn't cheap out, I bought the only version of vista that
i could. I was "forced" into a build a 2 months before vista launched.

I tried RC2, but it wasn't compatible with something I was using (don't remember if it was hardware or software)

then they came out with the get XP now, get a free VISTA. to get the version of vista I wanted, I had to get XP MCE, an OS comperable to windows ME in my book. and let me telll you, there were lots of unidentified hoops to jump through once I actualy tried to get my "free" Vista. at the time they were also stating how Vista was going to be 32 or 64, your choice, but you cant realy upgrade from 32XP to 64 Vista can you? (without that trick that may be "fixed" soon too)

so, basicly I paid $145 for a realy comprimised version of Vista home premium