Solution for “Virtual PC has detected an invalid or missing Product ID” error

If you are like me and use Virtual PC for developing SharePoint solutions, then you may have encountered the error “Virtual PC has detected an invalid or missing Product ID”.  It happens because Virtual PC try to find its product ID in registry, (Yes! I know Virtual PC never asked you to enter the Product ID during installion) and if it does not find it there then it displays this error.

Here is the quick fix for this error:

 

1. Open System Properties window by clicking System in Windows Control Panel
2. You will get the screen similar to the following



3. Copy the 20 digit long number displayed under Registered to: 
4. Goto Start->Run
5. Type regedit, It will launch the registry editor
6. Navigate to the following registry node My Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Micorosoft\Virtual PC\5.0\Registration
7. Edit the value of PID, by double clicking it
8. Paste the value of Windows Product ID, you have copied earlier. Following is an example screen shot of registry



9. Now you can run the Virtual PC normally

Registry setting for Sharepoint Configuration Database connection string

Ever wondered where does Sharepoint saves its configuration database connection information? Sharepoint 2007 saves its connection string for configuration database in registry and you can change it easily if you have moved your configuration database from one server to another. Following is the registry path

My Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Shared Tools\Web Server Extensions\12.0\Secure\ConfigDb

and our required key is dsn