2 win7 systems failed the oem serial number renew so they started going bonkers with mouse malfunctions and black flashes. The newest box was sitting and that had a retail so I installed that and the number worked but then the box started to get used so my new system went down again. Ubuntu 10.04 installed on two and suddenly no updates as only 12.04 and up were getting updates so new install on one box to 14.04 and the one I use the most got Debian Wheezy. Sent an e-mail to Acer as that was the one that had the oem # and the other one was running XP and that is coming to end of service life.
You would think for all Linux is supposed to be you would be above to find a caller-id program that took less skills than building a rocket.
Use XP if that is what you have the number 4. The Black Edition is still on a torrent I think and it would have all the updates already installed plus you get that neat Pirated XP desktop. Since that is what the old boxes had that is what the one will go back to as there is a spare HD sitting around otherwise no windows and the other one can wait for a number from Acer as the caller id was the only reason win7 was on all the time.
I probably have a spare XP number.
I wonder if a Vista with updates will work if Dell is a few years getting that number out? (i have a number for that so that might be my solution.