[X4U] Implications of Boot Camp

[Robert Ameeti]

At 3:14 PM +0100, 4/6/06, Stroller wrote:

>These do not come in a glossy box and the license key comes on a 
>sticker (which Microsoft would like you to attach to the side of the 
>PC) but are readily available. Microsoft would like you to believe 
>that OEM copies of XP are licensed only for the PC with which they 
>were originally sold (defined as the original motherboard), but (in 
>the EU, at least) a court of law will not uphold that position.

The license is restricted to be purchased by System Builders (defined 
as manufacturers who assemble and build computer systems.) Would the 
EU honor that portion of the license or is Microsoft just putting 
stuff on paper that means nothing?

>We're starting to see PCs regularly at the local dump

So you are thinking that the average Mac user is going to go to the 
dump to get a number so that they can call up Microsoft and say that 
they just upgraded a bunch of components of the computer and it is 
the same computer and Microsoft should authenticate their Mac? I'm 
thinking there is a hole here when Microsoft's XP authentication 
validator sees the MAC address as being from Apple. Kinda throws a 
monkey wrench in the works, don't you think?

And o by the way, that license number on that computer at the dump 
was a OEM license as well so it will only install using the original 
disks that the manufacturer supplied with that computer.
-- 

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Robert Ameeti

No good deed goes unpunished.
            -- Clare Booth Luce
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