Where to buy a OEM ?

happywarmgun

Almillar. Entirley your call - all power to you.

The price difference is circa £20 for Windows 7 Home Premium and £25 for Windows 7 Ultimate. Not a huge amount (and a much narrower gap than used to be the case for XP and Vista), but in the context of a forum where people want to get every penny of value, not an amount to be sniffed at.

Of course Microsoft say the software is not intended for home use - they would much rather you paid the extra. However, the terms of the license are such that if you are building your own computer, and willing to do your own support, you absolutley are entitled to buy OEM and your computer will be legally licensed.

The spiel about limited hardware changes invalidating your license is there so that they can stop people reselling licenses from old computers to new ones (there used to be a thriving industry indoing that). If you are upgrading your own machine, and your license key is therefore not traceable to a major supplier like HP or Dell because you bought it for genuine personal system build purposes, then you can upgrade away. I haven't hit the software limit (the number of times you can change away before it makes you ring them) on any of my Windows 7 PCs yet - but on XP you used to be able to make about 7 or 8 major upgrades before the software made you ring a phone number. You then simply rang the freephone number told them you had changed your motherboard and RAM or whatever you've just done and they gave you the key which always seemed to last for another few upgrades before having to ring again. I certainly never had to buy another copy of the OS for any of my machines during the full product lifecylce of XP. I don't anticipate doing the same for Windows 7.

Given this thread has been bouncing around for a while now, and given there are a ton of people out there who buy OEM and given not one person has come on and said 'Don't do it, Microsoft wouldn't let me renew my license' (as they surely would if it ever had happened to anyone) - I'm pretty confident in saying that JasX post number two in the thread which suggested buying OEM software was like burning your own money was pretty wide of the mark.

If you buy new whole machines regularly and are not an 'upgrade person' then retail probably is the way to go. If you upgrade bit by bit then OEM is certainly the way to go. Pay your money, take your choice.

To the OP - I personally would not but OEM from a computer fair, I'd buy from ebuyer or overclockers - chances are at a computer fair you end up with a bit-torrented copy anyway - then you really are having license issues.

JasX

happywarmgun wrote: »

To the OP - I personally would not but OEM from a computer fair, I'd buy from ebuyer or overclockers - chances are at a computer fair you end up with a bit-torrented copy anyway - then you really are having license issues.

Ebuyer you say...?

Win7 OEM edition £75 (or £82 if you want 32bit)
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/173791

Win7 RETAIL edition £65
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/175067

Clean install Windows 7 with upgrade media procedure:
http://www.winsupersite.com/win7/clean_install_upgrade_media.asp

lulz :rotfl:


PPS its only £65 at Tesco too

[Deleted User]

happywarmgun wrote: »

Of course Microsoft say the software is not intended for home use - they would much rather you paid the extra. However, the terms of the license are such that if you are building your own computer, and willing to do your own support, you absolutley are entitled to buy OEM and your computer will be legally licensed.

Incorrect. The terms of the OEM licence dictate how the software has to be deployed and if you're not doing it in that manner you are in breach of the agreement.

mikey72

This is going on a bit isn't it?
What happened to the good old days of 98 when one copy would see you ok for as many computers as you owned, for your entire life?

If you fancy vista for £23.50
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/119992

happywarmgun

JasX. You show the minefield that is the various versions.

If you look properly at the links the cheaper one is NOT for the retail version - it is for the Upgrade only version which I am sure you could open another can of worms on the licensing for....

The retail version is on ebayer at 94.99 - 25 quid more than OEM

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/168373

JasX

happywarmgun wrote: »

JasX. You show the minefield that is the various versions.

If you look properly at the links the cheaper one is NOT for the retail version - it is for the Upgrade only version which I am sure you could open another can of worms on the licensing for....

The retail version is on ebayer at 94.99 - 25 quid more than OEM

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/168373

no that is a RETAIL licensed version for £60odd happy, with a license that legally allows everything previously described in this thread for RETAIL licenses so far*, it's also the one I have on all my self built/upgraded machines (mine and OHs Laptop) clean installed to brand new hard drives.

upgrade and full RETAIL editions are essentially identical as per my 'clean install with upgrade media' link.... what else would you want the £90 version for? I sugest the OP save themselves an extra £10 by buying a fully licensed RETAIL version over the more expensive OEM one.

I agree 100% with mikey this is going on rather a bit :A


*yes its a minor grey area around the old double install method where you 'upgrade' from a free 30 day trial activation (tho you don't need to take it that far to get it installed, the type 2 extra commands during install has always worked for me on various win7 upgrade versions, as per above link). And 'minor grey area' I'm much more comfortable being in than 'clear breach of license but we figured how to get away with it with MS and nobody has have never had too serious a problem yet".... and yes i have the odd old fully licensed copy of windows XP lying around to backup my 'upgrade' license if ever microsoft fancy comming round my house (electronically or otherwise) to audit me

happywarmgun

It is going on a bit - though I find it inconsistent that you are a proponent of 'grey areas' on Upgrade licenses but so clear there is no grey area on OEM.

I found this fantastic article that summarises the debate we've been having...

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=1561&!!!!!col1;post-1514

The bloke goes for 75% of the article entirley backing up your point of view, then right at the end changes his mind and fully backs up mine...

I think everything has been said. I still wouldn't buy it from a computer fair - and I still wouldn't describe buying OEM as 'burning my money'.

spud17

Just to muddy the waters further, , recent Windows Secrets newsletters have been running a bit of a campaign regarding various Microsoft inconsistencies, e.g they actually condone the method of using an upgrade disk for a clean (double) install on a new HD, referred to by JasX.

One article points out that, in some circumstances, the update disk doesn't check to see if the underlying OS is legal or a pirate version.

Regarding the EULA, this apparently can vary, the EULA you click when installing, is often different to the one MS shows on its website, for exactly the same version.