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A report on life in Technical Support for a software company

Dave Mellors

April 2007 - Posts

  • Change Microsoft Office 2007 product key

    I recently installed Office 2007 on my laptop with the wrong product key and found instructions on Microsofts knowledge base for resetting the key but they didn't work. After 15 minutes of faffing around it eventually occurred to me that the registry setting for accomplishing this might be in a different place on an Vista x64 and sure enough it was.

     So, if you need to change the office 2007 product key and are using Vista x64 then try the following:-

    • Located the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Registration
    • Delete the DigitalProductID and ProductID subkeys
    • Exit the registry editor and try an Office App again

    x32 UPDATE:
    Quite a few people have contacted me for information on changing the product key for Office XP, Office 2003 and Office 2007 on 32 bit systems in particular Windows XP. I think this is quite well covered in other articles on the Internet (see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/895456) so I don't plan on repeating the information. BUT if you do find something that isn't covered by the Knowledgebase article and your aren't requesting a free key then let me know and I will see whether I can help.

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  • Top 10 Reasons - why I love working in technical support

    Why I love working in Technical Support 

    "I love my computer and its software;
    I hug it often though it don't care.
    I love each program and every file,
    I try to understand once in a while."
                         -- Dr. Seuss?

    Since leaving school I have only ever worked in a computer related job and I don't know if I really actually would want to do anything else. There are times in the past 15 or so years where I have in complete dispair proclaimed that I never want to work in IT again but if I'm honest I really enjoy working in IT.

    I started off formatting floppy disks for a company producing payroll software and progressed to the engineering team doing network cabling and fixing PCs. Since leaving there I have been employed in various roles including project management, team leading, software development and even running my own business but my favourite role has always been Technical Support.

    1. I love solving problems particularly ones nobody else has been able to.
    2. I enjoy sharing my knowledge with other people.
    3. I am an information junkie and information plays an important part of my job.
    4. My hobby is my job - I get paid to do the sort of things I would do (and still do) outside of work.
    5. Everyday is different - new technologies, new people and something new to learn.
    6. The nice people - it feels good when someone appreciates what you have done.
    7. The unhappy people - its good to make them happy again or at least happier.
    8. I get to be involved in all areas of the business and gain an understanding of the business that nobody else can get.
    9. The responsibility - I get a buzz from being the person everyone is relying on when something goes wrong.
    10. Each day I get to make a difference!

    Thinking about it, these might make good answers for interview questions.

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Copyright 2007 Dave Mellors
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