08 Mar 2007 at 15:45 - 10
The activation is no big deal. At the most, you simply have to call them and request a new key.
I am a "frequent caller" for windows activations, doing probably 20 of them a week. At most, it takes me maybe 5 minutes between making the call, and getting the "Thank You" message on my computer.
This however is why I reccomend doing all BIOS updates before installing an OS, be it Vista, XP, or anything else.
And BTW, MicroSoft removed the "changing motherboard" restriction to Vista. They did that even before it went for public sale. I am sure that the screams from small computer shops (like me) and from "early adapters" and "power users" (like me) finally made them wise up, and see that it was an excessive restriction.
And I have even had to reactivate XP because of BIOS flashes, new video cards, and new NIC cards. So this is nothing new.