Office license deactivation

[OilSheikh]

Right, I have a bit of a situation.

I have an Office 2003 Student edition which is supposed to have 3 licenses and I can't remember on how many PC's I installed it. Can I call Microsoft and ask them to deactivate all active licenses if I give them my Product Key ?

I have also been given an Office XP Student edition by a mate ( to be binned ). Can I also ask Microsoft to do the same thing ?

Thanks.


P.S. Both are retail genuine copies. No piracy crap going on here.

[blueball]

Don't know. Why not call Microsft and ask them?

[KeyboardDemon]

I would try to install the software first and see if it lets you activate it, if it doesn't then you have 30 days to use the software on a trial basis and that will allow you to contact Microsoft and see what can be done in terms of deactivating any current installations of the software. Though I think that usually requires software to be removed from a machine first.

[OilSheikh]

I just called Micrososft - 0844 800 2400. None of the Indian call centre folks had any clue. Sigh!

Googling suggests that there is no deactivation process in place. When you uninstall, it deactivates the license. If your Windows dies, what happens then ? You call the Activation no. and explain whats happened to them and they then increase the install count.

[mikemikemi]

Whenever I've reinstalled such software that didn't activate automatically it tells you to call a number. When you call it is to an automated service, you just tell it the number of machines the software is installed on and I assume it checks this against the code you've supplied it to determine whether that's ok. If it is it gives you a long code to manual activate the software (the code I received was 42 digits), doesn't take long, just be sure you've got the code right before you hang up.

[OilSheikh]

But, how do Microsoft control how many times the same software is installed ?
So, any Office Student Edition has 3 licenses.
Let's say I installed it on 3 PC's. HDD died in one of them and I had to reinstall Windows on a new HDD. As far as Microsoft are concerned, 3 licenses are still active. Now, on my new Windows, I activate Office again. That will become a 4th license then, won't it ?

[pctech2012]

I suspect (but don't know) that it looks for activations in quick succession which could suggest a mass hard disk loading operation.

[Gojira]

Have you re-installed Office and been given an option to activate by telephone? I think the number is different to the main MS UK switchboard system.

[mikemikemi]

But, how do Microsoft control how many times the same software is installed ?
So, any Office Student Edition has 3 licenses.
Let's say I installed it on 3 PC's. HDD died in one of them and I had to reinstall Windows on a new HDD. As far as Microsoft are concerned, 3 licenses are still active. Now, on my new Windows, I activate Office again. That will become a 4th license then, won't it ?

Not sure how it works but (I assume) when you tell them on the automated phone service you have 3 copies installed it checks against the license to see if that's ok, then allows you to activate; in some cases I think it can put you through to a human operator I assume when a certain key is getting multiple activations. I suspect the software will periodically check it's legitimacy with base (for updates at least), if you are only allowed 3 active licenses they will all report in but if a 4th occurs then it'll receive "This is not a legitimate copy...."-esque message. However, this shouldn't occur if you're just reinstalling after a bust drive or clean install.

[KeyboardDemon]

I thought they based activations on some sort of hardware signature so even after having to reinstall on the same PC with a crashed/replaced HDD it won't count as a new activation.

[OilSheikh]

Just tried installing on a VMware Win7 and did activation via net. All good. But, still doesnt tell me on how many more machines can I install it!

[scaryjim]

I'm pretty sure with earlier versions of office (i.e. before 2007) there was no overall track kept of activations. Presumably, this was on the basis that if you'd already paid for several valid licenses you were probably the kind of person who'd worry about it and potentially buy more licenses if you need them. I think that, as long as you personally don't have it on more than 3 PCs, you'll be fine; that is to say, the licenses cover three concurrent copies, rather than three consecutive activations. As with most Microsoft products the worst that's likely to happen is that you'll have to ring up to get the product activated. They're pretty sensible about managing licenses, and Office 2003 is hardly a high value product to them any more...

[OilSheikh]

Did more googling and Office XP Student edition has only 1 license. I have uninstalled it from my VM and I should now have an unused license