I seem to get this message just once in a while in the lower right part of the Windows 7 screen. It's a genuine copy (purchased from Costco), so why is this showing up maybe once or twice a week?
Weird that no one is answering this common question. I don;t know if this is the definitive answer but what I've found under a Microsoft Forum is that running the same Win7 instance from BootCamp and from Parallels is considered two separate machines (by MS) and hence needs two licenses. The problem is that it is the same instance of Win7 so you cannot enter in two licenses... what a catch 22. MS is claiming that Virtual machines are separate machines requiring separate licenses. It worked fine under Parallels desktop 6 but it could also be one of the Windows updates of it's activation checking engine... worked fine in Parallels Desktop Mac v6 but doesn't work in v7. Each time I try to fix it and go back to using Win7 the other way, it says it's not genuine and needs re-activation .... until you run out of chances and you have to call MS to get a new activation key.
Finally! An answer to fix Win7 Activation issues when using BootCamp and Parallels (and a great one at that!)... http://kb.parallels.com/en/9703 posted Feb 27, 2012. Requires at least Parallels Desktop 7 for Mac Build 7.0.15050 and higher. Allows two separate Product Activation codes or the use of the same one (once in BootCamp and once in the Virtual Machine). Hooray, I can use my Woin7 in either BootCamp or Parallels again!
