[Maui Nick]

Oh ye of little faith.

I don't know what software or computer company that you work for but I assure you that you can use the product key over and over and over and over AND OVER. I've seen it done. Hell, I've done it.

Yeah, that's good for you. At least, until the next in a long line of Windows XP security holes is discovered and you can't get updates because Microsoft refuses to service two installations of Windows that happen to share a product key.

And you don't need much RAM. I've ran XP on a computer from '97 with Windows 98 on it... It works.

Yes but how well? Microsoft recommends 256 megs of RAM for most users, and once you start adding in things like anti-virus programs, Web browsers, word processors, spyware killers and so forth, that 256 fills up very quickly.

Besides, computer years are like dog years cubed. She's better off replacing it, and if her monitor and other peripherals (keyboard, mouse/trackball, printer, and so forth) work well, she can get just a computer -- and a pretty good one -- for not much more than a copy of WinXP by itself.