Cheap Windows 10 License Keys

alan_d

I've bought a few cheap W7 and W10 keys from ebay over the years (usually under £5) and so far all have been fine, no issues down the road.

mroshaw

I was a Technet subscriber for years, and enjoyed the benefits of multiple OS activations, amongst other server based technologies that were useful for my business,

I'm not looking for ways to bypass the system and get cheap keys - I'm pretty certain that the only moral way to go is to pay £120 for a license from Microsoft for a new build. I'm just surprised that Microsoft and / or Amazon haven't cracked down on what is pretty blatant fraud - selling license keys, whether 10 or 7 or whatever, at a stupid price, under cutting the price of a proper licence.

How and why is this okay?

arciere

Microsoft has played this game for quite some time now, I think it's just a matter of finding a compromise between security and practicality. I mean, there must be million of keys among all the Microsoft products, I don't think it's that easy to monitor each and every one of them (and if you do, you also need to make sure you don't block genuine keys, which could mean real trouble).

Why is this okay? Because 'it activates', so until someone (Microsoft?) says that the key is not genuine, you feel like you're doing nothing wrong.

To be fair, at the moment there is no practical way of finding out whether a key is genuine or not (you would have to trace it back to where it was purchased and what the agreement was), but, as almost everything, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

mroshaw

I guess the only way to obtain a "genuine" key is to buy it directly from Microsoft, as I've done. It would appear that (re)selling / buying, buik, OEM, MAK keys is essentially fraud, even if it's not well policed,

dipsomaniac

By allowing everyone to update their personal devices to win 10 for free i think microsoft has changed its business model as it realises it cant keep charging huge amounts to update its os.

arciere

dipsomaniac wrote: »

By allowing everyone to update their personal devices to win 10 for free i think microsoft has changed its business model as it realises it cant keep charging huge amounts to update its os.

Well, the thing is that the free upgrade was for those who had a valid license already in the first place. Windows 7 (and 8) are still supported, so from a user's perspective there was no reason to urgently update to the latest O.S. (from a security point of view).
New licenses were never free, generally speaking.

mroshaw

AndyPix wrote: »

Yeah, well, I don't feel like I've been taken for a ride TBH. Just 'cause they're a huge organisation, doesn't mean anyone should feel smug about ripping them off

that

I do commend some posters challenging (accusing) Amazon and Ebay with the sale of illegal licences and piracy, plus the lack or willingness of MS to police it.... Think some posters have big cahones, and potentially very deep pockets too!

Some unwitting people had the windows 10 update forced upon them thanks to ms updates, and had to upgrade. Either Auto updates, or a misguided click left them with 10, often with no easy way to downgrade that fully worked

The main aim of free windows was to create a market where public bought from its store, like Android. Capture the store and capture the market - in theory any way.

The popular Raspberry PI also introduced a new generation to Linux. There was also talk of an Android OS for PCs once too, and Lindows/Linspire. Linux is a sleeping threat, and gone are the days where there was no gui and difficult installs. LibreOffice is quite good too and free. Possible potentially spend would have been around £400 vs free? I think a good few would have walked to Linux - who knows, but the linux crowd are still steadily growing - just look at the download figures on distrowatch.com. Home Windows market was going to shrink, and of the opinion MS mitigated this, while hoping to make money from its store.

The home market is very small. Most if not all manufacturers install some version of windows pre-sale. All corporate will have most likely have Pro on them.

Think it would be fair to say that if you bought a secondhand blank 'business' laptop with uefi, its details are already in the MS licensing DB and bios, and the PC will probably validate with Pro, though some may need the bulk license image of Pro. Ours are licensed twice, the sales version that we wiped, and then our corporate version build.

I would say, if those £2 ebay/amazon keys work, then they are legal, and it is not our duty or in our remit to police MS standards or its working practices, or speculate where those keys came from - they are valid. If the current practice was a threat to their business model they would have change it, or brought out windows 12 and a new licensing strategy.

arciere

that wrote: »

I would say, if those £2 ebay/amazon keys work, then they are legal, and it is not our duty or in our remit to police MS standards or its working practices, or speculate where those keys came from - they are valid. If the current practice was a threat to their business model they would have change it, or brought out windows 12 and a new licensing strategy.

I disagree. You can download thousands of movies online free of charge (let's say torrent) and, you know what, they work! Same applies to websites that stream live football matches. You connect to them and watch the match free of charge. Why should I think it's illegal, since Sky or BT Sport haven't shut down the website?
Does this make them 'legal'? No it doesn't.
You wouldn't say the same thing if you found those Windows keys on Google, free of charge, would you? I think you would be suspicious about the origin of those keys? So, what does it make it 'legal'? 'Free from a Google search' vs £120 license is not legal, but a license paid £2 is?

As I said earlier, I'm not judging here, I'm only saying that the fact that it activates, doesn't make it legal. You can take an OEM key from a Dell computer, for example, and use it in your home computer, it works, but it's not legal under Microsoft terms.

Then we can discuss about Microsoft's policy, about how expensive their products are, but that's another thing.

Chino

that wrote: »

I would say, if those £2 ebay/amazon keys work, then they are legal

It was never going to be long before the "I don't want to pay for this so I'll steal it instead" brigade crawled out of the woodwork.