Official Vista Retail License

[kalniel]

Seeing as Vista Licensing is one of the three topics that gets rehashed most frequently, I wondered if people would enjoy looking at the official documentation?

http://www.microsoft.com/about/legal...s/default.aspx

Things that already caught my eye were (bolding my own):

2.b. Number of Users. Except as provided in the Device Connections (all editions), Remote Access Technologies (Home Basic and Home Premium editions) and Other Access Technologies (Ultimate edition) sections below, only one user may use the software at a time.

No split screen multiplayer anymore? (edit: ah.. device connections may allow for this, actually.)

5.a. The software will from time to time validate the software, update or require download of the validation feature of the software.

c.or you may not be able to: use or continue to use some of the features of the software

Does this mean an internet connection is required for continued use of Vista?

8. SCOPE OF LICENSE. The software is licensed, not sold. This agreement only gives you some rights to use the software. Microsoft reserves all other rights. Unless applicable law gives you more rights despite this limitation, you may use the software only as expressly permitted in this agreement. In doing so, you must comply with any technical limitations in the software that only allow you to use it in certain ways.

As expected - some people seem to think that they own the software therefore have a right to use it as they will. This makes it clear you are just buying a license.

15. REASSIGN TO ANOTHER DEVICE.
a. Software Other than Windows Anytime Upgrade. You may uninstall the software and install it on another device for your use. You may not do so to share this license between devices.

No limit on number of times you can do this...

b. Windows Anytime Upgrade Software. The first user of the software may reassign the license to another device one time, but only if the license terms of the software you upgraded from allows reassignment.

..Except for the upgrade versions only. As to be expected.

In general I'm very impressed by the clear and understandable wording of the license too.

[Funkstar]

In general I'm very impressed by the clear and understandable wording of the license too.

Yeah, makes a change

No. 5: This sounds just like the WGA validation tool that gets downloaded from windows update periodically. It will probably be a bit more seamless, but Vista isn't goint to suddenly stop working if it can't get an internet connection to validate over. People with laptops would be screwed if it did. I would interprerate that as being "if your copy of Vista fails the validation it might stop working" rather than "if Vista can't validate it will stop working"

just my take on it

[this_is_gav]

One of the business versions or VLK or something actually does have to be activated every 180 days if you use your own activation server.

[Rack]

What about OEM? I'm trying to find it, hope to see something similar, but tbh considering the price difference I seriously doubt it.

[Mike Fishcake]

One of the business versions or VLK or something actually does have to be activated every 180 days if you use your own activation server.

Yep - Vista Enterprise. That's the one we're using here.

[kalniel]

What about OEM? I'm trying to find it, hope to see something similar, but tbh considering the price difference I seriously doubt it.

Vista OEM license information isn't available yet, which is a bit odd given that people will be building and selling systems with it very shortly. (It's not even available to registered system builders - maybe it's available to certified and gold partners only at the moment.)

I expect the only change to be the end condition, stating that OEM can only be installed on one device and it may not be transferred to another device.
Note there is no definition of what a 'device' is.