reinstall XP new drive...arg!!

[K G]

Hi ok heres situation. ANy help would be appreciated.
My hard drives boot sector is dying ..or at least something is. So I bought a new drive. I need to reinstall XP pro onto new drive but I dont have my activation code anymore. All the hardware is the same...just HD changed.

Ive tried the whole copy your wpa.dbl file but I cant get into safe mode without 1st putting in code. Arg... whats the best way to do this? I dont want to wait till monday to call microsoft.

This is what I was going to try...but cant get to safe mode on new drive. Is there a code on the cd?? Or in my old registry?? I cant find it.

1. Double-click My Computer
2. Double-click on the "C" drive
3. Go to the C:\Windows\System32 folder (you may have to click on the link that says "Show The contents of this folder")
4. Find the files "wpa.dbl" and "wpa.bak" and copy them to a safe location. You can copy them on a floppy drive or burn it onto a CD or DVD.
5. After you have reinstalled Windows XP on your reformatted hard drive, click "No" when asked if you want to go ahead and go through the activation process
6. Reboot your computer into SafeMode (you can either press F8 as Windows is booting up to see the Windows Advanced Options menu and select SAFEBOOT_OPTION=Minimal or follow the instructions in Starting Windows XP in SafeMode
7. Double-click My Computer
8. Double-click on the "C" drive
9. Go to the C:\Windows\System32 folder (you may have to click on the link that says "Show The contents of this folder")
10. Find the file "wpa.dbl" and "wpa.bak" (if it exists) and rename them to "wpadbl.new" and "wpabak.new"
11. Copy your original "wpa.dbl" and "wpa.bak" files from your floppy disk, CD or DVD into the C:\Windows\System32 folder
12. Restart your system (if you followed the directions in Starting Windows XP in SafeMode you may need to go back into MSCONFIG to turn off booting into SafeMode)

[K G]

forget this..ive never dealt with anything more rediculous than this..just trying to reinstall my os. I guess I have to go pay ms another 200 bucks for XP tommorow. My hard drive wont even boot so...running a program to get this stupid activation code wont work..and even if I do get it, its gonna see a new hard drive and not let me install because of the hardware hash or whatever. I cant wait till monday to call em.

[Drew27K9]

I just had the same problem with my HP Pavilion 310n where I had to install a new hard drive. After I installed the new hard drive, I loaded up my seven recovery cd's from HP and it placed windows XP back into the computer. I didn't need the code.