# MS Office 2010 has lost the activation key - won't take a replacement

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-office-2010-has-lost-the-activation-key-wont-take-a-replacement/713791>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [February 27, 2015, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-office-2010-has-lost-the-activation-key-wont-take-a-replacement/713791 "2015-02-27T18:55:28Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Cardinal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardinal/32/4000_2.png) [@Cardinal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardinal)\
**Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-office-2010-has-lost-the-activation-key-wont-take-a-replacement/713791/1 "2015-02-27T18:55:28Z")

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Any ideas on how to get Office to take a replacement key? Whenever it boots, it says this is an unauthorized copy. When I try to type it in again, I get:

“The setup controller has encountered a problem during install. Please review the log files for further information on the error.”

Is there something I can do that’s short of reinstalling it?

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**Author:** ![The\_Joker\_and\_the\_Thief](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e79b87/32.png) [@The\_Joker\_and\_the\_Thief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Joker_and_the_Thief)\
**Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-office-2010-has-lost-the-activation-key-wont-take-a-replacement/713791/2 "2015-02-27T19:35:52Z")

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What do the log files say?

If you’re technically skilled you could possibly replace the setup controller without replacing the entirety of Office. But that would almost certainly be more work than reinstalling the whole suite.

In fact, even diagnosing the problem is probably more work than just reinstalling everything. It’s like how nowadays its often cheaper to throw out appliances than have someone repair them. Unless there’s some very good reason why you can’t just reinstall, I’d recommend that.

There is also the possibility of trying to repair office – [see here](https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Repair-an-Office-application-7821d4b6-7c1d-4205-aa0e-a6b40c5bb88b?CTT=1&CorrelationId=a87414f8-cca5-44a2-8b90-ef3c8fd63693&ui=en-US&rs=en-US&ad=US).