Okay, I have a major problem with my copy of 2k. When I got my laptop, it came preinstalled with Win2k Pro on it, but I recently installed SuSE Personal over it. When I realized that I wouldn't be able to pen-test wireless networks with my Broadcom-based wireless card on Linux, I wiped SuSE (that was yesterday) and began the win2k installation procedure so that I could dual-boot the two OSes.

Here's the problem: Dell, in all their glory, apparently shipped the UPGRADE disc with the laptop, not the full-blown installer. Now the installer is asking me to verify that I own a previous copy of Windows (NT, 98, 95) by inserting the disc along the way. I really don't want to buy another version of Windows, since all I really need to do is run the wireless card on Windows and that's it. Does anyone know of a way to bypass the verification procedure? I know for a fact that I bought 98 at some point, but I don't have the disc anymore.

O.K. this is a shot ,but

There is a small Fat 16 partition on Dells ( mine is about 50 Mb) it is the Setup program. The key for original O/S are in there. If you can point the W2K installer to that drive it might work????????

Where you the registered owner , maybe buy a disk from Dell??????

You have to own a copy of Windows NT/95/98 in order to install that Upgrade. Any way around this check would be just plain illegal. Complain to Dell if you like.