Here is another reason not to buy a dell computer.
We decided to sell max's old dell laptop. Unfortunately at the time we didn't have a restore CD. So we decided to install an OEM version of XP Home (and use the license key on the bottom of the laptop). XP installed without any issues (happily taking the CD key), yet when we went to activate online, the key wasn't accepted.
After talking to both Microsoft and Dell (calling dell isn't a quick process) we found out that the CD key that comes with the Dell computers is not compatible with a standard XP install. You MUST use the dell recovery CD. Another interesting thing, is that the recovery CD doesn't even need a cd key! Odd.
So yeah we ended up needing to reinstall windows with the recovery cd which we luckily found.