Windows activation

[RobbieRoy]

Well, your effectively telling the truth.....and it's less fraudulent than running one of the many SLIC loaders or KMS emulators!

Are you saying two wrongs do make a right?

[shaithis]

Are you saying two wrongs do make a right?

No, I'm just saying it's a grey area. What constitutes that PC not being that PC any more? So technically even if you replaced the motherboard it's still the same PC, just Microsoft wants to try and classify it otherwise.....personally I wouldn't let them get away with that! Plus, there are other easier ways to activate, even if you don't have a valid license......I've always felt retail pricing was a ripoff and OEM licensing was a con. If Microsoft adopted a more sensible approach to home licensing we probably wouldn't even need to have this conversation

[RobbieRoy]

No, I'm just saying it's a grey area. What constitutes that PC not being that PC any more? So technically even if you replaced the motherboard it's still the same PC, just Microsoft wants to try and classify it otherwise.....personally I wouldn't let them get away with that! Plus, there are other easier ways to activate, even if you don't have a valid license......I've always felt retail pricing was a ripoff and OEM licensing was a con. If Microsoft adopted a more sensible approach to home licensing we probably wouldn't even need to have this conversation

I agree with your sentiments on MS's licensing approach over the years, tying the OS to the hardware in a bid to maximise sales upon upgrade to better technology. It was a master business stroke from Bill Gates/MS's point of view as it meant that they were effectively able to structure the deals and cash in on the growth of personalised IT right from the very start of the whole industry.

You may well call it a rip-off and a con, but caveat emptor. Unless we propose revolution, there's nothing we can do about it, unless we're willing to break the law because we disagree with the legal licensing structure. If so, what would be the next law we'd decide to ignore because we felt it was wrong?

I know the law's an ass, but I don't think that excuses personal anarchy!

[Game388]

Depends how different the motherboards are. If you're replacing with the same then it should be fine as the drivers will all work. If not, it'll probably work, but might complain a bit.

As the posts above yours say, if you're replacing motherboard due to failure MS will let you transfer the license.

Once i had a pc, and when i changed the mobo, it just blue screens at me, forcing me to re-install windows. it was a pain. However all documents / files are saved inside the hard drive, it creates a new "windows.old" folder which contains all your old stuff. If you really have to re-install it, don't worry, you documents are all safe, you just need to move it back to the new install

[noveltylamp]

As long as you're using the same CPU and chipset manufacturer as before (e.g. Intel/Intel) it will likely at least boot up giving you the opportunity to install any missing drivers, the days of different HALs and having to have the correct HDD controller in the critical device database as with XP are long gone, but if you've got access to another PC it's worth putting a copy of the correct NIC drivers on a USB stick in case they're missing and you can't get online!