You cannot use an upgrade edition to flatten the system and start all over.
You need XP to be installed and activated before running Vista Setup. You
do not need updates after SP2. Only a full edition of Vista can install
Vista the way you are trying to do. Vista does not verigy XP via a shiny
media chedk. Sorry.

"jhoelz" <jhoelz@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:0CDD2226-9D9A-4354-A014-2B626D8DF3D8@microsoft.com...
>I purchased Windows Vista Ultimate Upgrade yesterday in loaded it just fine
> on my machine that was running a validated version of XP Pro using a clean
> install. Everything went fine as I poked and tweaked with some of my other
> software installs. After loading all of my stuff, even that I did not want
> just for testing purposes I decided to do another clean install of the OS
> to
> wipe out any of the junk I did not want.
>
> I installed the DVD, fired up the machine and booted from the DVD. Went
> through the installation process, a clean install, entered the key and
> formated my drive. THats all the farther you can go, I get the "To use the
> product key you entered, start the installation on a computer that is
> running
> a genuine version of Windows".
>
> So no I need to reinstall XP Pro, do the updates to get the WGA installed
> and then re-install Vista.
>
> If this is right this is total garbage, everytime I want to do a clean
> install I need to install the previous OS first? As someone who works in
> the
> tech industry I iften need to install other 3rd party software for testing
> and review. In the past when it bunged up my machine I would just do a
> clean
> install, insert my previous verison of windows and go on my way.