Responding to the myriad complaints over ambiguities and outright uncool (that’s a technical term) licensing terms, Microsoft has revised the Vista retail license to remove some of the most major causes of complaint. A previous version of the Windows Vista retail license restricted the number of times you may transfer Vista from one device to another. The license read: “The first user of the software may reassign the license to another device one time. If you reassign the license, that other device becomes the ‘licensed device’.” The new license has removed this language relating to device transfers.
Bloody finally! How could they expect people to buy their software, get a better pc/upgrade it, and then be told “you can’t install this any more, naughty you!”
Now to find out more about the Ultimate terms sneakily mentioned as that’s the one I’m getting!
I am very happy they finally saw the light and changed the EULA. I build my own systems and always changing stuff around and upgrading parts. Glad they saw the light as I was not going to purchase Vista with that in effect. Very happy as I very much like Vista and now am looking forward to buying a copy or two.
Edited 2006-11-02 22:48
At the end of the day, the customer still rules. You make a loud enough stink about something, and they will respond
It also goes to show just how easily placated the customer base really is.
Wierd a few minutes ago I saw a story on /. that they’re making a deal with Novell and now this. Maybe our old friend Bill got visited by three spirits last night.
Mighta slipped in the shower this morning and was brought back to consciousness with a sense of reality ..
Was probably never going to be in the final EULA anyways
Thats my feeling about this. It was probably never going to be there but this was an easy way to make people feel like they have a victory and hence be more inclined to get into Vista.
Remember as well the no-VM in Home is still there.
It was probably never going to be there but this was an easy way to make people feel like they have a victory and hence be more inclined to get into Vista.
I just think most people don’t care/know about EULA… for them it makes no difference at all that this limitation was in and then removed (they won’t even know). But some (many?) among those who care/know will just think “they tried but they failed”. If MS did it to get more people inclined to get Vista, I think it was a poor move…
Anyway, that’s a good news
Edited 2006-11-03 00:43
“Remember as well the no-VM in Home is still there.”
I think this is no problem because users of the “Home” edition won’t want to install it in a VM – most of them won’t even know what a VM is. 🙂 As far as I know, the “Home” edition will be pre-installed on machines for the home user (as the name “Home” says). And the home users just won’t care. Will they read the EULA or just go there and clickityclick? 🙂
Agreed. It was just a way to generate some much needed good press before the release.
can’t… control… ARG!!!
I can’t help but be skeptical, like ubit and abdavidson above, but with all the strange things that Microsoft has been doing lately (listening to customers?!?) I also can’t help but feel that they might actually not be so bad after all. Maybe they aren’t trying to fleece and take advantage of their customers at every turn… maybe they’re just… misguided?
We’ll see I suppose.
I think those that view Microsoft as some kind of evil, demonic tool of repression is a tad melodramatic.
Microsoft, like any large corporation wanting to increase its profits, will always test the boundaries to see what they can get away with, but they are not going to risk unnecessary flack (or even potential lawsuits) by going too far if their source of income (their customers) are not happy. Since most copies of Windows are going to be OEM, they really lose very little by allowing a bit of latitude to those customers who by the retail boxed editions, since if they didn’t, they would lose a small but very important base of enthusiast users.
People seem to ascribe motives to MS that it doesn’t have – they are simply trying to protect their investments (their attempts to do this are arguably misguided), but it is doubtful that they have some sinister intent to deprive people of their rights, although that may sometimes be the end result of their policies.
So do i have to upgrade my computers hardware very 2 months
Simply recognising reality of the consumer protection regimes in which they will be selling. It would have inevitably led to a real test of the enforceability of post sale restrictions on use. This would have gone against them, and their less stringent restrictions on other matters which are still too strong would have been blown up along with the Vista ones. So the smart thing was to drop it, and keep the illusion of the current regime’s being enforceable.
Virtual machines will probably be blown up as well if tested.
w00t!
You may use the software on up to two processors on that device at one time
This part is a bit vague. Does Microsoft give a solid definition (i.e. one that isn’t referenced by a web site only) of what they mean by processors somewhere? There are a lot of possible definitions for what those processors might be.
Does Microsoft give a solid definition (i.e. one that isn’t referenced by a web site only) of what they mean by processors somewhere?
Microsoft’s gone on the record many times stating that “two processor” means “two sockets”, not “two cores”.
http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/highlights/multicore.mspx
OK. I already knew that MS has a website defining what they recognize as a processor right now. Neither your post nor the website within it answered my question though.
A website is easily changed. So, I would prefer something more tangible within the EULA itself.
Besides, the website still doesn’t answer the question very well. It definitely didn’t state what you did in your post.
“Q. What is a “processor”?
A. A physical processor is a single chip that houses a collection of one or more cores. A core is a collection of one or more processor threads and a set of shared execution resources. A processor thread is the architectural state within a processor that tracks execution of a software program thread/task.”
By this definition, Intel’s new quad core “processors” would be defined as two processors since there are two chips.