Installing Windows XP on a Macbook Pro with Parallels

I installed XP with a friends' license whilst my genuine XP license was on order from the supplier.

I managed to successfully get windows running in bootcamp and parallels (2.5).

My XP cd arrived and I went through the process of changing the key code (using Microsoft's key update tool), but I foolishly did this from within parallels. Windows would run fine under parallels, but as soon as i rebooted natively, it was no longer active and stopped working.

In the mean time, I had upgraded to Parallels 3.0 which seems like it's working fine.

I also upgraded to Bootcamp 1.3

I couldn't figure out how to activate windows using the same license code directly as I had used when running under Parallels.

So I decided to reinstall windows. Here's a list of glitches.

- There's no page down key on a MacBook Pro, so you cannot read the EULA (but who reads it anyway)
- The Win XP Pro installer crashes if you have a mighty mouse plugged in. ( copyright 2004. yay)

I also reformated the win partition as NTFS.

Needless to say, I'm not in a happy place. Some combination of NTFS, Parallels 3.0, and Bootcamp 1.3 means that it's just not working, and I'm installing Windows for the third time today in a last ditch attempt to get it working.

At one stage it all looked good running natively. I installed Bootcamp drivers, windows updates, I got the activation thing sorted out, thanks to Sharon (my name for any non-human voice system.)

But as soon as I tried to boot it under Parallels, hang after hang after hang. Windows wouldn't even do a safe boot. Kept hanging after loading 'MUP.SYS'. Great.