Greta news indeed Mike, thanks a lot for the update.

This is great news! Thanks for sharing this Nick. It is nice to know that Microsoft has been listening, and hopefully this will ease the concerns of many in the enthusiast community who were concerned how this licensing might impede their upgrades.

Thank you for doing the right thing.

Absolutely great news!  Yep, I was one that would be greatly effected by this.  With the large number of hardware changes and formats I go through, every year.

Thanks again!

-Eric

Great News! Now I don't have to wait until I build a new system to install Vista.

From Windows Vista Team: Windows division has revised the retail license terms for Windows Vista in a

Thank you Microsoft! I know I for one was not enjoying switching to Linux as the original Vista EULA was forcing me to do. Its good to be able to once again be back in the Microsoft Camp.

Thank you MS, and Nick White in particular.

I was pretty sure y'all would come to your senses on this (and have said so). And now you have. Excellent, excellent news.

Nick White from the Official Windows Vista Blog just posted some very interesting news . It appears that

Great news, everyone is happy with this change :-)

The Hallelujah Chorus is being sung a little early this year!  Thank you! :)

This is good news. Great news in fact. This was my number one issue with Vista and would have kept me from buying an upgrade license.

I'm still a bit concerned about two things.

 1) The virtualization clause(s)

 2) Prohibition of DRM'd content inside a VM.

These are dramatic changes from XP's licensing. I think MS owes the community an explanation here.

#1 is going to cost MS a good number of Mac/Linux users to skip Vista. The restriction seems unneccesary as well. Anyone competent enough to run a VM'd environment has good reasons to want to do it. Someone willing to bootleg the OS doesn't give a hoot about the EULA anyway.

#2 just does not belong in the license for a general purpose OS. It feels "out of place" because it is!

My 2 Cents...

Spotted by the eagle-eyed Claus: Microsoft apparently has backed down on its Windows Vista license restriction that limited transfer of the operating system to a new machine only once. From the Window Vista Team Blog: I'm very pleased to let...

Great! As Microsoft partner I'm happy. Now we can capitalize on enthusiastic power users to push Vista into companies!

Great news! Now do us Lexmark owners a favor and cook up a driver for our Lexmark 3in1s that will work in Vista.

Brilliant, brilliant move!

Then again, I didn't expect anything less.

Thank you very much for taking the time to inform us of this change.  I was quite worried about and thinking of giving up Vista.  I will now most certainly get it.

And you are right Nick,I AM jealous. Any openings?

This is the sort of thing Microsoft needed to do to win back the hearts of the Enthusiast Community. Well played.

(For the record, I felt that the previous version of the EULA was written with the phrase "stab the Enthusiast Community in the heart" instead of "win back the hearts of the Enthusiast Community", which is very easy for lawyers to confuse.) ;)

Bitch I do, but I have to give credit where credit is due when I saw that the license terms...

Good, I'm happy I can actually do my yearly hardware upgrades without having to fork out an additional $300-$400 just to keep my OS license current.

I'm sure a heck not thanking you though. You should have never tried to pull a stunt like this in the first place. You've left us with a very bitter taste in our mouthes.

Okay  I have an idea for really pumping up the good buzz about Vista.  Randomly select Vista RC1 and other beta testers and give away a free copy of Vista!  Not all beta testers, but just some - maybe give away ten copies per day in the first month that Vista debuts - either in November or in January.  What do you think?   Hey, I can dream can't I?

BTW, I'm currently running Vista RC1 on my home built PIV, my Mac Book Pro, and on my work PC  a Dell GX620.  With the exception of Vista running a tad too hot on the MacBook Pro, it seems to handle everything I have tried so far.  All systems have 1 gig of RAM (the MacBook has two gig), and high end video cards.  Love that Aero!

Better; much, much better.

As PlanetAMD64_Guru so accurately said, this is *precisely* what Microsoft needs to do to re-engage with the likes of us.

It's good to know you've listened to what we've said and though I also understand where mesostinky is coming from I will say well done. Perhaps in future releases you can consider EULA ramifications along with the actual technical/product testing during beta phases. People like us are probably a better audience to bounce ideas off than the lawyers.

Anyway, once it's released I can feel an order for Vista coming on, now I've just got to decide which version. :)

Let's recap the whole situation for a moment.

The XP (Home) EULA says:

"You may move the Product to a different Workstation Computer.  After the transfer, you

must completely remove the Product from the former Workstation Computer."

The previous Vista EULA said:

"reassign the [Windows Vista] license to another device one time." [1]

In [1], Paul Thurrott argued that MS was not taking away any transfer rights/privileges in Vista. This is because those transfer privileges were already taken away in XP. Yes, apparently the XP EULA meant that you can only transfer *once*. He admits it was "vaguely worded". He backs all this up with an interview with "Microsoft general manager Shanen Boettcher". Shanen said that the clause was only intended for hardware failures. He said that "it's always been per device". The rest of that section explains that almost nobody would reach this restriction, therefore it is unimportant.

Throughout he refers to some "online pundit" who is misguided, throwing myths around, etc. This is Ed Bott on ZDNet. He replied to this article [2] who says he's read well in the area and that "I've never heard this claim made". He links to five places on the MS international websites, all of which talk about the transfer. None of them suggest any more than the original XP EULA that the transfer can only happen once. i.e. They don't mention any such restriction at all.

Paul Thurrott even posted somebody else's reply [3] to his article, but it hardly addressed the revisionism of his first article, only talking about how ridiculous this enthusiast thinks the restriction is.

On the Vista Team Blog, the new license prompted lots of feedback, almost all negative and much of it angry. The team only said that they would "help us all make informed decisions" and "clarify" (paraphrases).

Now we get a new license term replacing the one which caused the controversy:

"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."

Compare this to the XP version:

"You may move the software to a different device.  After the transfer, you must completely remove the software from the former device." (I have replaced "Workstation Computer" with "device" and "Product" with "software").

Notice the similarity? However, according to Paul Thurrott and Shanen Boettcher, the second version means you can only transfer *once*, whereas the first version (according to this blog) means you can transfer unlimited times. Can somebody explain where the difference is?

[1] http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/winvista_licensing.asp

[2] http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=158

[3] http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/winvista_licensing_reply.asp

So r3m0t stated we get new license terms:

"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."

The way I read the new terms they seem more favourable or equivalent to the Windows XP terms.  Im no lawyer though, and you'ld probably need  a good lawyer to understand all the fine print in any EULA.

I'm pleased that Microsoft appears to have listened, but that enthusiasm has been tempered somewhat by the paragraph that follows:

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.

If I purchase Windows Vista Home Basic in January, and then upgrade later to Home Premium or Ultimate via the "anytime upgrade" option, does this mean that I'm basically screwed out of that upgrade after a single transfer to another "licensed device?" In other words, I'd be stuck with Windows Basic unless I forked over cash to Microsoft yet again for another "anytime upgrade?" I'd love to think that I'm wrong in this assumption, but the licensing terms don't seem to indicate that.

Why can't Microsoft simply admit that this entire notion was a mistake, and strike it from the licensing agreement completely? I was reasonably happy until running across the above-mentioned paragraph.

Glad to see Microsoft have seen the light.  Lets take this in the faith it was done, and people running dodgy copies of Vista, report them to piracy@microsoft.com

As an enthusiast who has always built his desktop PC's and ebay'd his old components, this is good news.

I second cwysong on an official clarification on virtualization rights for each Home SKU. My interpretation and that of a member of the Windows Server team is that Vista Home Basic and Home Premium may be used in a VM, but you need an additional license for that VM instance (sicne the license says you can't use the copy installed on the licensed device in a VM), wheras Ultimate allows the same license to be used both on a physical machine and a VM on that same machine.

Check here for the Windows Server team member's comments:

http://blogs.technet.com/windowsserver/archive/2006/10/17/Virtual-Hard-Disk-format-becomes-open.aspx

cwysong, #2 is likely in the license because it isn't generally a good idea to run such technologies in a VM. You basically weaken any protections you'd normally have since multiple instances of a VM may look the same (someone could copy your VM image and gain access to your rights managed data). You may also run into timing, performance (particularly with something like BitLocker), or other issues (the VM's drivers may not support such scenarios) that affect such technologies. In the case of a scenario like purchasing protected media inside a VM, depending on the service/license used your media may only be playable within the VM -- not a good situation if you can't sync to a device or the VM doesn't have enough performance to render the media.

Finally, there's the issue that MS probably doesn't want to support those scenarios currently bucause they haven't tested for such scenarios (and can't support every VM).

Let's get those virtualization terms clarified too, for us Mac users who don't want to pony up for the expensive versions of Vista.  

In particular, I have an XP site license (legit) running on my Mac.  There's no incentive for me to upgrade if I have to buy Ultimate.  

For that matter, why not let people run one instance of Vista virtualized, even on the basic editions?  Otherwise, you're encouraging people to install Linux and install Vista in a Linux-hosted VM.

Microsoft is listening to it's customers? Surely this is a first?

Anyway, hardware tinkerers and serial upgraders constitute a large percentage of the tech savvy crowd that have unofficially supported Windows and Windows users for years. Many of us provide the front line in support on how to resolve issues with Windows based machines, through forums, support groups, mailing lists - and even though just helping family and friends, which saves MS a vast amount of money in support requests.

It would be madness for Microsoft to piss these people off - and to potentially loose this wide base of expertise.

This is the best breakfast that wake me up from a nightmare for a long time :)

Thanks nWhite for your efforts in relaying our views and getting things changed.

Now I can go back from testing ubuntu (which is great!) to testing RC2 again......

Yay! I may upgrade after all.

How about fixing the Virtual Machine restriction too.  It is just as ridiculous.

I must say, when I first heard about the terms I was extremely upset, I have been on the border about getting Vista when it comes out or within 4 months and that really pushed me towards no. This change really pushed me back towards yes, and giving the Microsoft Vista team a human face that is listening really helps, I (we) appreciate taking what we expect and enjoy into consideration.

Sometimes it’s hard to simply do the right thing.  I’m very elated that Microsoft decided not to limit the installation of Windows Vista on a system.

As a system builder who loves tinkering on the latest technological advancement and the certain pride that comes with building a computer system that far exceeds the quality of pre-built systems out there (yuck!), I have to give Microsoft tremendous respect for the foresight in recognizing the contributions we as system builders contribute to the PC world.

=====================

System Configuration:

Windows Vista Ultimate (x86)

AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4200+

1 GB RAM

Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe MOBO

2 320 GB SATA HD

2 120 GB SATA HD

26” Widescreen HDTV LCD w/ Dual DVI (1920 x 1200)

NVIDIA GeForce 6600 GT Video Card SLI w/ Dual DVI

Audigy 2 THX Certified Sound Card

Case: Ultra  

The virtual machine thing is the next thing that should go. This has almost as many people annoyed as the hardware upgrade restrictions did. Again support professionals (which include many individuals offering both formal and informal support, even down to the small workshop and office level) need to be able to access virtualisation technologies at all stages - so that if there are to be multiple different versions of Vista, we need to be able to access and support them all without the costs becoming prohibitively expensive. This is where virtualisation can often become useful. As things stand, it almost feels that MS is trying to drain blood out of a stone - when in fact in many cases, there is simply no more blood to be had.

I would counter argue the point that a virtual machine is a separate device (different hardware) than the original system and running the OS in an VM on the licensed machine WHILE SIMULTANEOUSLY RUNING THE OS on the same machine which provides the underlying platfrom for the VM software will actually break the one machine, one license rule.....

Although, Ultimate edition seems to be explicitly granted this right, this right does not exist for XP or XP Pro anyway so this wasn't something that is new.

But the fact that the Windows Anywhere Upgrade license transfer restriction did not get altered at the same time baffles me more......

Even worse than the restriction that still remains with the Windows Anytime Upgrade license transfer is another part of the licensing agreement. If I'm interpreting it correctly, if you buy the upgrade version of Vista, then you lose the right to continuing using the operating system that you're upgrading from.

Three very important titles in my software library will not work with the most recent release of Vista--and, Microsoft, if you're telling me that I lose the right to run Windows XP, on a separate partition, if I buy the upgrade version of Vista, then you can ***keep*** Vista. If I can't maintain an older operating system for compatibility purposes, then I want no part of Vista or its oppressive licensing scheme.

I hope to God that someone initiates a class action suit against Microsoft--four weeks ago, I honestly didn't feel this way.

I'm of the firm opinion that the outcry about the licensing term simply boils down to: "If I'm only running a single copy of Vista, I want to run it on whatever I wish."

I think Microsoft has addressed this problem very clearly, and I really have no problem with any of the rest of the licensing terms. I am very glad for this resolution, because my group is currently going to be starting some significant application development using the .Net framework. I was one of the strong proponents who advocated the .Net approach for our software.

I had two six hour meetings so far on this subject, and frankly there was more than one person advocating the abandonement of our .Net initiative in favor of a more generic approach. I am thankfull and relieved that I now look like less of an idiot--I have stopped updating my resume.

Yay!

Delighted to see that Microsoft has seen the light and that the comments raised by sites such as HEXUS.net and their readers have been taken on board -  so sincere thanks for that.

But, repeating what others have said here, two of the three original limitations that I was also most concerned about are unchanged:

* The restriction that sees partitions on a single hard disk treated as separate devices remains. So, seemingly, you still won't be able to set up a single copy of Vista on different partitions or drives on the same PC. Consequently, you'll have to buy a copy for each boot partition or boot drive if, say, you wish to have one version of Vista carefully optimised for heavy duty tasks such as video or sound editing and another set up for more general use.

Or have I got the wrong end of the stick?

* The Basic and Premium versions remain unable to work on virtual hardware - such as Parallels Workstation or VMware Workstation - even if that application is running on top of the original Vista installation. Ultimate will still be the only one of the three retail versions to allow you to use Vista this way.

These two restriction seem mean-minded given that the tax-inclusive cost of each retail version of Vista is so astonishingly high.

In the UK, prices (pre-order from Amazon) are £155 (US$296) for Basic; £190 (US$363) for Premium; and an outrageous £325 (US$620) for Ultimate.

So let's, please, get those two restrictions lifted before launch day next year and, please, let's try to get the pricing down to rather more reasonable levels for all three versions.

MS Vista team just announce the licensing terms for Vista was changed, which allow you to move retail...

newscientist2000: I think you missed the point of my original post. The point is that (an employee of) Microsoft claimed that the XP EULA only allowed one transfer. (See the last EULA clause in my post). Now this blog claims (implicitly) that the new Vista EULA allows any number of transfers. (See the second-last EULA clause in my post). However, THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE. MS could easily bring back their limited-transfer plans in a big way in Vienna, and claim that *both* the XP and Vista license agreements ONLY EVER ALLOWED ONE TRANSFER ANYWAY. It's as though you need to talk to a relevant Microsoft employee in order to know what the license agreement is *supposed* to say, but doesn't.

wh5916: It is sad, but their might be a few technical problems with infinite transfer for Anytime Upgrade. After all, the webserver would have to store your license key with the level you upgraded to.

n4cer: Except for the comment that when you purchase media in a VM your usage may be limited to that VM, your reasons all seem bogus. The more likely explanation is that Microsoft don't want people to crack their DRM/BitLocker or even to inspect it in detail. A vM could allow you to track the CPU and RAM in great detail. They don't want to give you that help if you choose to (attempt to) crack MSDRM.

Il semblerait que ces derniers temps je parle pas mal de Microsoft et de leur nouveau Windows Vista, et que la plupart de mes billets sur le sujet sont trs critiques. Pas plus loin que hier, par exemple, je vous parlais encore de la gourmandise de...

November 30th is now Vista Launch day !

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6110958.stm

Excellent comments from r3m0t !!!

I think for one you exposed Paul Thurrott with his pants down, especially the ludicrous (and somewhat lame) claim of "oh actually it always meant to say that, but didn't".  

I mean, come ON, is MS short on lawyers who can word a relatively simple set of rules clearly?   If so, where do I apply? :)

n4cer: I agree, I think the *intended* effect of those clauses in the Home Basic and Home Premium licences is to say that you cannot *reuse* the same licence key within a VM Guest OS as you are using for the Host OS - you must obtain a new licence for each Guest OS. The *wording* however is so poor that it seems to be suggesting that you are not permitted to use Home Basic or Home Premium as a Guest OS, period. That's what people are so angry about.

If that is the intent, the wording needs to be corrected. I realise that this needs to be finalised very quickly so it can RTM, but it must be corrected to meet the real intent.

I don't agree with this restriction - as I said on a Channel 9 Coffeehouse thread, adding virtual machines to a physical machine reduces the overall capabilities of a system rather than extending them, so I don't see why I should have to buy additional licences to use VMs. In the end, Microsoft are shooting themselves in the foot, by restricting some hobbyist developers, who don't have the resources to buy Ultimate or multiple Home Basic or Home Premium licences, from testing their creations in a clean environment.

The section about DRM in a VM seems to be advice not to use the DRM features within a VM, which presumably is some technical limitation within those features (probably that the TPM module is not virtualised). If this is the case, the software needs to have a warning about running in a VM (tricky) and the restriction placed in a README or other documentation, but it does *not* belong in the EULA.

From Vista Blog : I’m very pleased to let you know you this morning (or afternoon, or evening, depending

Good news.  I feared that the previous set of terms would really come back to bite people (but especially me :->) in the ass a few years down the line.  

Bring on Vista!

r3m0t, in the case of BitLocker, performance and weakened security are real concerns. Performance is a given. You're taking an already slow process (accessing a virtual harddrive) and slowing it even more by adding encryption/decryption on top.

For the case of weakened security, BitLocker uses boottime metrics to determine whether someone has tampered with the system and whether or not it should release keys to decrypt the harddrive. If it can't differentiate between a VM running on your computer and a VM on an attacker's computer, you have added security from BitLocker. The attacker can copy your VHD(s), run it on their system in VPC and BitLocker may boot the system normally, not knowing it's in a different system (note: I have not actually tried this scenario). Secure Startup isn't so secure anymore.

Support and testing are also real issues. If MS advises you not to run in such scenarios, this frees them from any obligation to support you if you choose to do so and also limits their test matrix.

RE: Cracking/Analysing their rights management technology

In the case of BitLocker, there are technical documents and blog posts from the dev available online that decribe how it works and the encryption algorithms used.

http://blogs.msdn.com/si_team/default.aspx

For technologies like WMDRM, sure they want to protect their investments and those of their customers, but there are legal protections that go beyond the EULA for dealing with entities that would distribute software that compromises those technologies.

Brilliant news indeed.  

As a modder this would have added to the problem I already have (Living in gibraltar I have to call the UK to reactivate any time my main board changes (which is often in the extreme overclocking world I live in) as the Spanish free fone is a) not free and b) in spanish lol

Thanks MS :D

Fantastic news!

Not only I will be able to use Vista IRL, I have learned to take the time to actually read the EULA before I agree to it....

Now could someone do me a favor and give those lawyers a good kick somewhere? The EULA is a legally binding document and this one is still very poorly formulated. Specifically the one time restriction still seems to apply to transfering the software to another person(like when you sell the computer with the software)and to upgrades. If this is by design, my guess is you're going to hear some  more shouting about it, if it's a "miss" someone should loose their bonus.....

Oh, one more thing: the part about publishing benchmark results, when I do that, you're most welcome to publish your own results about my software, as that is currently non existent. Really, what are you going to do? Publish benchmarking tests of Doom III if they publish benchmark results on how that runs on Vista?

<<<The restriction that sees partitions on a single hard disk treated as separate devices remains. So, seemingly, you still won't be able to set up a single copy of Vista on different partitions or drives on the same PC. Consequently, you'll have to buy a copy for each boot partition or boot drive if, say, you wish to have one version of Vista carefully optimised for heavy duty tasks such as video or sound editing and another set up for more general use.>>>

This concerns me as well, as I currently have two installs of Windows XP on the same system, on two separate hard drives. One is purposely stripped down, with not even an anti-virus program running, for audio/visual work.

Now, in this Vista licensing agreement, we're being told that only one copy of Vista can be run on a single machine.

What's the difference whether I have a single Vista install on my one computer system, or four if I choose to run them? And I'm not about to spend money on this overpriced Vista operating system more than once, just for the privilege of having different installs on the same machine, each optimized for a specific function.

I'm already having problems enough this year, with the two Windows XP reinstalls that I've done, using my legitimately purchased (from a local Target store, not Ebay or some other odd channel) June 2002 copy of Windows XP Home Edition.

On both occasions, when online activation was attempted, I was informed that the number of activations for my registration key had been exceeded...um, excuse me? I PAID for XP, and if I want to reinstall 100 times during the life of the software product, that's my right as far as I'm concerned. Both times this year, I've been forced to call and speak with some barely intelligible rep from India, to activate my legitimate, purchased copy of Windows XP.

I'm weary of Microsoft at this point, and am sorry I ever defended or recommended the company to anyone.

Mike, I agree that the wording should be clearer WRT virtualization rights, and that the implication of "licensed device" clause in the current agreement as I understand it is that (in the case of Home Basic/Premium) you can't reuse the same license. A better wording wold be something like:

--------------------

4.  USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES.  A virtual (or otherwise emulated) environment is considered to be a seperate device. You may use the software within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system. You may not do so to share this license between devices.

-------------------

A change in that clause may require a change in this clause:

-----------------

2.  INSTALLATION AND USE RIGHTS.  Before you use the software under a license, you must

assign that license to one device (physical hardware system).  That device is the “licensed device.”  A hardware partition or blade is considered to be a separate device.

-------------------

to also include a virtual (or otherwise emulated) environment as a licensed device, or they can insert a part "d." to the INSTALLATION AND USE RIGHTS clause to include language specific to the software's use in such environments.

I also agree that virtual machine rights should be included in the home SKUs under the same license as long as they are running on the same physical device. While it's true that many home users won't use this capability, it can be useful, and would be welcome since Virtual PC is free, and it has to be addressed eventually with hypervisors and application virtualization coming from MS in a few years. If support is an issue, Microsoft could stipulate that VM useage on the Home SKUs is allowed, but not supported.

How the folks at Microsoft didn't realise this to begin with is absolutely beyond me. The fact that it was suggested in the first place tarnishes my opinion of MS, I mean, come on...

Atlast the Vista licensing policy has been revised by Micrsoft today. This is really a great news!!!

This is great news! Thanks for sharing this Nick.

---------

http://www.dl4all.com

I originally said NO to Vista just because of the "transfer rule." I now say a heartly YES.

I am sort of shocked (I didn't think MS cared about "us", but incredibly happy over the change in the EULA !!

It's a shame that there's people here that can't just say thanks, without bitching

Thanks for listening Microsoft.

:)

After hearing the initial licencing terms I decided not to buy vista or any microsoft products for that matter for home use. As I'm training to become a software engineer I'm kind of stuck on the windows plaform at work. But even there I would have found a way to switch to a different platform (using mono for instance). If I can't add/remove/replace hardware as many times as I like, windows is not the operating system for me.

With this change I can purchase a copy of Windows Vista :)

Thanks for the clarification r3m0t on your comment.

Good news on the Vista licensing front.

I am very pleased with the change in the licensing, however I too am concerned with the 'Virtualization clause'. I run two RC1 installs and a single RC2 currently as I test different software and driver compatibility.  I would like to continue to do the same with the RTM version as I test patches and service packs.

n4cer: Thank you for explaining why BitLocker on a virtual machine is insecure.

Your reasoning seems to be that Microsoft is protecting all of us from making a silly mistake such as trusting BitLocker on a VM to secure all our data. They are doing this by "advising" us not to do it, or indeed, not to use BitLocker on a VM at all.

This "advice" comes in the form of a legal contract. (Legal in some countries, anyway...)

You may be aware of a registry key in Vista (RC1 at least) which allows you to run Aero on any graphics card, instead of trusting the MS hardware detection. On an underpowered computer, all you need to do is open regedit, change this key, then switch from Aero Basic to Aero. Of course, MS hardware detection actually *is* always right, and your full Aero will run like a dog. *BUT IT'S MY CHOICE TO TURN IT ON*. Maybe you should suggest a change to the EULA which prevents people from running Aero on people's computers when Vista thinks their computers are inadequate?

Maybe the EULA should tell me that my Windows password(s) must be resistant to dictionary attacks?

Maybe the EULA should tell me that I must run a virus scan on any attachments I receive through Windows Mail?

Maybe the EULA should tell me not to run any unsigned drivers? In fact, it already does! (See the deliberately vague "technical limitations" clause.)

Chanchao: Assuming that the manager Thurrott quoted is a real employee, and that he really said what he did, then it's not just Thurrott caught with his pants down.

Better than the previous terms ! thanx !

Thanks for being not quite so evil, Microsoft.

Due to the EULA changes, I was originally planning on waiting until I next upgraded my PC before I bought Vista. That would've been very disappointing.

Now, I can happily pick up Vista on day 1 knowing I'll be able to continue using it even through future upgrades.

Thanks for listening! :D

This could be great news as long as they follow through. The "virtualization" licensing aspect of Vista still bothers me, but I was equally concerned about Microsoft's "reinstallation" policy with Vista. Sounds like they might be listening to the grumbling

hi, im a pc user, and i use only windows on my pc, and i reed about the license terms of vista, i cant believe they give us 2 chances to install, i've reinstalled my xp about 10 times, because the virus, the performance (at time windows become slowly) and the news is i cant install more than 2 time vista (in the same pc) !! its microsoft nuts !? i cant believe that. they have to release or try another idea. i will buy vista, and i can use the software in (one) pc only, so many times i need to reinstall i want. thats commun scence i think.

bye

XP was almost the final straw with its activation feature, which makes it a royal pain when you want to buy a new PC.

Then, the price of Vista is outrageous, especially considering that that division has something like an 85% profit margin. There is no reason for it being so expensive.

So my last XP box is my last Windows box. No more Windows. Linux Forever. Yayy!!!

Nick,

Are there differances between the EULA rules for the full retail and the upgrade.  I think the only way I will be able to afford vista will be to buy the upgrade.

thanks

<<I originally said NO to Vista just because of the "transfer rule." I now say a heartly YES.

I am sort of shocked (I didn't think MS cared about "us", but incredibly happy over the change in the EULA !!

It's a shame that there's people here that can't just say thanks, without bitching>>

Did you try reading the entire revised licensing agreement, and not just the single portion that was quoted in the topic that started this thread? ***That's*** why people are bitching.

Microsoft cares? Try reading the entire licensing agreement, and not just the single portion that they reworded.

I am also very pleased this change has taken place, but like so many others, I'd like a clarification, change to the virtualization licensing.

I can't imagine not having the right to use my soon to be bought Vista Ultimate in one, two,... VMs on the same device.

As mentioned before Virtual PC is free and not having this ability would severely limit those of us who make a living supporting Windows machines, testing patches, software,...

I do appreciate the change in the EULA as a step in the right direction. It means I will now consider purchasing Vista instead of riding XP til it's end of life.

One other concern. I've got the same question as "mcampb209" I own two copies of XP Pro and two copies of XP home installed on various computers. I plan on buying upgrade versions one at a time to replace these installations eventually.

As long as I buy the proper upgrade in the first place and don't resort to using Windows Anytime Upgrade I am assuming I can still change all the hardware I want as long as windows resides on one PC. Is this correct?

Of course the new draconic limitation on installing the OS on more than one partition on the same computer and the new draconic limitation of being able to sell you computer with Vista only once, also have to go. Needless to say no such limitations ever existed in XP.

See also the discussion at http://shellrevealed.com/forums/3/4555/ShowThread.aspx

The second of the above limitations prevents you from transferring your computer with Vista on it for example to another family member more than once and in practice makes it much more difficult for you to sell your computer even once. As explained in a previous post on this thread,

According to CNet's http://news.com.com/5208-1016-0.html?forumID=1&threadID=22083&messageID=193621&start=-36

this means that

"Nobody in their right mind would buy a used Windows Vista PC because, under this licensing, they can never get rid of it. If they cannot transfer the OS to a 3rd party, nobody will buy it from them (except for pocket change)."

This reminds me of the joke about the poor man that comes to a Rabbi and complains that his house is very small and crowded, and the Rabbi tells him to get a goat and put it also in his house. After a week, the guy comes again to the Rabbi and the Rabbi asks him how are

things now, and the guy replies that it is even more horrible now, having to put up also with the goat in the house. So the Rabbi tells him to now remove the goat, and the guy immediately feels that it is much better now. So if you think about it, the fact that Microsoft introduced

and then removed the goat of the one time reinstallation does not make this a happy ending yet. The above limitations must also go of course.