Finally time to dump win2k?

Glocksman · Post by **Glocksman** » 2006-09-04 11:00pm

Darth Servo wrote:I was under the impression that the copyright was for one user, not one computer and said one user could load it on as many of his own machines as he wanted. Guess I was wrong?

The license is per machine.
OEM licenses are tied to the machine that they were originally installed on.
The machine dies, that license dies.
Though if you build your own machine and buy an OEM copy from Newegg or somewhere and later replace the mobo, supposedly you can call MS and they'll reactivate it for you.

Retail copies (full install or upgrade) aren't limited to the machine that they were first installed on (though you're still limited to it being on only one machine at a time), so if you upgrade a lot, buying a retail copy makes more sense than an OEM copy.

My own copy is an Upgrade disc that I use an old copy of Win98 as proof of eligibility.
I run the XP install disc and when it asks for proof of eligibility, I pop in the 98 CD, it checks to see if it's a valid CD and then I remove the 98 disc and put the XP install CD back in and proceed from there as if it were a full install disc.

Pezzoni · Post by **Pezzoni** » 2006-09-05 11:51am

Braedley wrote:There are so many more power features on Pro that for a user like Mike, it's well worth the money. And it's not holding your hand through everything for the first week. Hate to tell you this, but Home is for your grandma and the young family with their first computer.

Have you ever actually used XP Home? I've used it for the last 4 years, on various computers and have only ever once encountered a situation where Pro would have been useful... And that was easily rectified with VNC. It may be that you need some of the features in Pro (the ability to join a Domain, the features associated with this, and the Group Policy editor, for example), in which case it is the obvious choice. For general usage at home, however, most will simply not require those features, and may as well save themselves the £40 instead.

Braedley · Post by **Braedley** » 2006-09-05 04:52pm

Glocksman wrote:
Darth Servo wrote:I was under the impression that the copyright was for one user, not one computer and said one user could load it on as many of his own machines as he wanted. Guess I was wrong?
The license is per machine.
OEM licenses are tied to the machine that they were originally installed on.
The machine dies, that license dies.
Though if you build your own machine and buy an OEM copy from Newegg or somewhere and later replace the mobo, supposedly you can call MS and they'll reactivate it for you.

Retail copies (full install or upgrade) aren't limited to the machine that they were first installed on (though you're still limited to it being on only one machine at a time), so if you upgrade a lot, buying a retail copy makes more sense than an OEM copy.

My own copy is an Upgrade disc that I use an old copy of Win98 as proof of eligibility.
I run the XP install disc and when it asks for proof of eligibility, I pop in the 98 CD, it checks to see if it's a valid CD and then I remove the 98 disc and put the XP install CD back in and proceed from there as if it were a full install disc.

I got an OEM copy with my first ccomputer, and it's now running my new computer, and I had even less trouble authenticating it than the last time I installed it on my old computer.

Pezzoni: Look at Alyeska's post, then look at mine again. Yes, I have used Home, doing in house tech support and troubleshooting for an electronics store I worked at, and I never want to use it again, because I know that when I want to do something relatively powerful with the OS, it'll take twice as long and be ten times as hard.

Glocksman · Post by **Glocksman** » 2006-09-05 05:36pm

Braedley wrote:
Glocksman wrote:
Darth Servo wrote:I was under the impression that the copyright was for one user, not one computer and said one user could load it on as many of his own machines as he wanted. Guess I was wrong?
The license is per machine.
OEM licenses are tied to the machine that they were originally installed on.
The machine dies, that license dies.
Though if you build your own machine and buy an OEM copy from Newegg or somewhere and later replace the mobo, supposedly you can call MS and they'll reactivate it for you.

Retail copies (full install or upgrade) aren't limited to the machine that they were first installed on (though you're still limited to it being on only one machine at a time), so if you upgrade a lot, buying a retail copy makes more sense than an OEM copy.

My own copy is an Upgrade disc that I use an old copy of Win98 as proof of eligibility.
I run the XP install disc and when it asks for proof of eligibility, I pop in the 98 CD, it checks to see if it's a valid CD and then I remove the 98 disc and put the XP install CD back in and proceed from there as if it were a full install disc.
I got an OEM copy with my first ccomputer, and it's now running my new computer, and I had even less trouble authenticating it than the last time I installed it on my old computer.

Microsoft says you can't do that.

Another common misconception is that you can transfer a preinstalled or OEM copy of Windows from an "old" machine to a new machine. An OEM software license may not be transferred from and old machine to a new machine—even if that machine is no longer in use. The OEM license is tied to the machine on which it was originally installed and can't be transferred to other machines.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-05 06:12pm

It's always struck me as deeply stupid that they tie the license to the machine. It's like saying I can only watch Miami Vice on my DVD player, and if it's lost or broken or sold, I can't watch it any more and have to buy it again.

Of course, I've had the same case for almost ten years, so it's still the 'same' 'machine'. So what's the aim of this bit of legalese? Is it just to stop a household buying a single license and using it four or five times?

Pint0 Xtreme · Post by **Pint0 Xtreme** » 2006-09-05 06:27pm

It's only a matter of time. I'm also ditching Win2K and getting XP Pro with my new computer but finding the settings to change the look of the desktop is going to be annoying. I hate their green/blue scheme. As far as first impressions go, I remember being turned off immediately by the annoying comic-like look of the default XP desktop.

RThurmont · Post by **RThurmont** » 2006-09-05 06:39pm

The cost aspect of upgrading your existing LAN to XP Pro could be made less onerous by buying brand name hardware with XP Pro preinstalled. Since you're talking about a relatively high cost of installing it on older machines, in my opinion, the smartest move is to simply get all new equipment with XP preinstalled, keep one Windows 2000 box to ensure backwards compatibility, and then add an additional Linux installation to your new equipment. Of course, there is the dual-booting/compatibility issue, so the trick would be to find a PC vendor that was large enough so that you'd get reasonably good pricing, yet that could also provide an additional Linux installation, partitioned hard disks, an added hard drive, or another means by which you could install Linux.

Another option could be to switch to Macs, use the Mac OS X for work and browsing, and run XP and Linux on select systems using parallels, but then you would open several additional cans of worms, including Apple's proprietary lock-ins, and the recent spate of quality control problems on the new Intel macs.

A third, somewhat less viable option would be to discontinue buying new computer games. From my perspective, 90% of new releases these days suck completely, another 9.95% are barely playable, and the remaining 0.05% might not be worth upgrading your entire LAN to get access to. That said, Spore certainly does look promising...

Braedley · Post by **Braedley** » 2006-09-05 09:21pm

Glocksman wrote:Microsoft says you can't do that.

Sorry, let me clarify. OEM pricing (may not actually OEM version), but not pre-installed. And few Canadian courts would accept Microsofts arguments against my fair use argument, assuming that I had wiped the drive on the old computer.

Dominus Atheos · Post by **Dominus Atheos** » 2006-09-05 10:29pm

Stark wrote:It's always struck me as deeply stupid that they tie the license to the machine. It's like saying I can only watch Miami Vice on my DVD player, and if it's lost or broken or sold, I can't watch it any more and have to buy it again.

I wish that was all the movie companies wanted to do. Ever heard of DIVX?

Drooling Iguana · Post by **Drooling Iguana** » 2006-09-05 11:44pm

Braedley wrote:Pezzoni: Look at Alyeska's post, then look at mine again. Yes, I have used Home, doing in house tech support and troubleshooting for an electronics store I worked at, and I never want to use it again, because I know that when I want to do something relatively powerful with the OS, it'll take twice as long and be ten times as hard.

If you want to something relatively powerful with the OS, why are you using Windows at all?

Dominus Atheos · Post by **Dominus Atheos** » 2006-09-06 12:15am

Drooling Iguana wrote:If you want to something relatively powerful with the OS, why are you using Windows at all?

Because it's impossible or near impossible to play games on linux, and mac gaming is the most retarded idea I've ever heard of.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2006-09-06 12:22am

Dominus Atheos wrote:
Drooling Iguana wrote:If you want to something relatively powerful with the OS, why are you using Windows at all?
Because it's impossible or near impossible to play games on linux, and mac gaming is the most retarded idea I've ever heard of.

Boot camp.

But I agree, gaming is windows only and looks to stay that way.

Post by **Edi** » 2006-09-06 12:59am

Braedley wrote:
Glocksman wrote:Microsoft says you can't do that.
Sorry, let me clarify. OEM pricing (may not actually OEM version), but not pre-installed. And few Canadian courts would accept Microsofts arguments against my fair use argument, assuming that I had wiped the drive on the old computer.

Microsoft can go get fucked. OEM install CDs can be sold here with new PCs. The license terms may say whatever, but if they happen to run contrary to Finnish laws, they are null and void. This is one of those cases. Besides, when you build your machine yourself, how exactly are they going to keep track? If you swap out the insides, you need to reactivate every time the mobo changes and often when the processor changes. If the old equipment gets broken, you're not required to buy a new license, just reinstall the old.

Sucks to be an American in this respect, because the laws in your country all seem to be geared toward fucking the consumer over as much as possible. Half the shit in software EULAs is outright illegal here on account of unreasonable terms and relative positions of consumer and the software company plus all kinds of privacy violations and so forth. Good fucking luck trying to get them enforced in court here as long as the consumer has paid for the software license and is not pirating it.

Edi

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2006-09-06 01:47am

RThurmont wrote:The cost aspect of upgrading your existing LAN to XP Pro could be made less onerous by buying brand name hardware with XP Pro preinstalled. Since you're talking about a relatively high cost of installing it on older machines, in my opinion, the smartest move is to simply get all new equipment with XP preinstalled, keep one Windows 2000 box to ensure backwards compatibility, and then add an additional Linux installation to your new equipment.

I'm not about to replace a pair of 3GHz Pentium-4 machines with 1GB RAM any time soon. They may not be leading-edge but they're still modern enough to play the games that are on the market right now. That's my general standard for computing upgrades: when I start regularly seeing software that I can't run for some reason, then I upgrade whatever the bottleneck is.

Of course, there is the dual-booting/compatibility issue, so the trick would be to find a PC vendor that was large enough so that you'd get reasonably good pricing, yet that could also provide an additional Linux installation, partitioned hard disks, an added hard drive, or another means by which you could install Linux.

It's easy to do that with any vendor's box by simply re-installing the OEM Windows version that comes with the machine, or by using software like Partition Magic to resize the existing partition.

Another option could be to switch to Macs, use the Mac OS X for work and browsing, and run XP and Linux on select systems using parallels, but then you would open several additional cans of worms, including Apple's proprietary lock-ins, and the recent spate of quality control problems on the new Intel macs.

A third, somewhat less viable option would be to discontinue buying new computer games. From my perspective, 90% of new releases these days suck completely, another 9.95% are barely playable, and the remaining 0.05% might not be worth upgrading your entire LAN to get access to. That said, Spore certainly does look promising...

My son has BFME2 and he wants me to upgrade at least one other machine so I can play it against him.

RThurmont · Post by **RThurmont** » 2006-09-06 03:05am

For some reason I had a massive brain fart and the idea of reinstalling the OS from the OEM-supplied disk didn't occur to me.

From the sound of it, the two computers in question are definitely not life-expired, so forget my post in general.

atg · Post by **atg** » 2006-09-06 03:16am

If you don't want to replace the PCs, and I can see why, then you would have to buy the full retail version of XP.

The rules on OEM software from Microsoft is that it has to be bought with and pre-installed by the system builder on a fully assembled pc.

The old rules allowed you to buy an OEM copy with a keyboard for example.

You could probably find someone willing to sell you the OEM copy without the required pc, but to be fully legal the only choice is the retail copy.

Dominus Atheos · Post by **Dominus Atheos** » 2006-09-06 03:36am

That's not true anymore. Nowadays you can just buy it by itself.

atg · Post by **atg** » 2006-09-06 03:51am

My previous post is a bit wrong, you can get it if you are buying a complete pc to build yourself, but you are incorrect on buying it by itself.

Microsft wrote:OEM system builder software packs are intended for PC and server manufacturers or assemblers ONLY. They are not intended for distribution to end users. Unless the end user is actually assembling his/her own PC, in which case, that end user is considered a system builder as well.

I would provide a link, but it is restricted to registered members of the Microsoft system builder program.

Post by **Edi** » 2006-09-06 04:02am

atg wrote:My previous post is a bit wrong, you can get it if you are buying a complete pc to build yourself, but you are incorrect on buying it by itself.

Microsft wrote:OEM system builder software packs are intended for PC and server manufacturers or assemblers ONLY. They are not intended for distribution to end users. Unless the end user is actually assembling his/her own PC, in which case, that end user is considered a system builder as well.
I would provide a link, but it is restricted to registered members of the Microsoft system builder program.

There is no way they can actually enforce that 100%, so buying an OEM version from some small store would probably be quite successful. I know we sold one to a user who had a Win2k that had been fucked up by malware. She brought the comp in for repairs and removing the malware broke Win2k. She upgraded so we just installed off of an OEM CD and sold the license to her.

It's the ones who systematically do that on a large scale who get snagged.

Edi

atg · Post by **atg** » 2006-09-06 04:14am

Edi wrote:There is no way they can actually enforce that 100%, so buying an OEM version from some small store would probably be quite successful.

I know; that's why I said "You could probably find someone willing to sell you the OEM copy without the required pc, but to be fully legal the only choice is the retail copy", a couple of posts previously.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2006-09-06 02:04pm

I figure it's basically in compliance, since I originally bought these machines sans OS, so if I go back to the same store and buy an OEM copy of Windows XP Pro, it's just retroactively being sold to go on the new machine that they sold me.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-09-10 02:25pm

In Canada at least the police go after bigger fish. There's a mall called Pacific Mall where you can buy knockoffs for virtually anything. There's so many knockoffs and pirated shit that sometimes legitimate store owners stock them by accident, and it's hard for them to compete. We accidently bought a knockoff USB pen and blackma--er convinced the store owner to give us other free shit (too bad for him, he wasted our time he should've known better). It got bad enough that if you didn't look Asian they didn't want to sell you knockoffs (some people buy knockoffs to save $). But there's always Asian looking cops and stings and the stores can get busted selling them. But, it's so profitable new stores just spring up overnight.

Dominus Atheos · Post by **Dominus Atheos** » 2006-09-10 05:01pm

I don't think it's illegal to sell OEM by itself. Fry's Electronics does it, and they haven't been shut down.

SCRawl · Post by **SCRawl** » 2006-09-10 05:09pm

Dominus Atheos wrote:I don't think it's illegal to sell OEM by itself. Fry's Electronics does it, and they haven't been shut down.

It's contrary to the license under which the software is purchased, so I suppose that counts as illegal. (This link comes from the Microsoft Small Business Community Blog. The link to the actual license requires logging in.)