Metropol

Sput wrote:I'm surprised it's not been cracked yet. It took, what, 8 days for XP to get WPA killed?

It was within a few days.

Basically, on installing Vista you get a 3 day evaluation grace period before the activation timer starts counting down. The grace period can be effectively made infinite and thus prevent the required activation. (Unless, of course, Windows Update puts the kibosh on the crack.)

I remember there being a sort of unoffical, but no-software-required, workaround whereby you could reset the activation countdown a maximum of 5 times or something.

Andrew Wood wrote:

Sput wrote:I'm surprised it's not been cracked yet. It took, what, 8 days for XP to get WPA killed?

It was within a few days.

Basically, on installing Vista you get a 3 day evaluation grace period before the activation timer starts counting down. The grace period can be effectively made infinite and thus prevent the required activation. (Unless, of course, Windows Update puts the kibosh on the crack.)

What if you don't wanna connect the PC to the 'net?

Beardy Bob wrote:

Andrew Wood wrote:

Sput wrote:I'm surprised it's not been cracked yet. It took, what, 8 days for XP to get WPA killed?

It was within a few days.

Basically, on installing Vista you get a 3 day evaluation grace period before the activation timer starts counting down. The grace period can be effectively made infinite and thus prevent the required activation. (Unless, of course, Windows Update puts the kibosh on the crack.)

What if you don't wanna connect the PC to the 'net?

It makes no difference. If you don't connect to authenticate it will lock itself up.

Trust me.

Anyhoo, I decided to get rid of Vista until I have a legit version (and after SP1 or even 2 has cleared the bugs). It took almost 20 hours of work over the weekend to get my laptop restored. I had to instal Ubuntu over Vista to allow me to repartition and format, and then my XP disc failed to read so I had to work with a USB stick and lots of fiddly drivers.

Vista can be activated by telephone as well (totally automated system if you press the right buttons) so you don't even need an internet connection.

It's perfectly possible to have multiple computers all using the same product key because you easily tell the automated system that its a fresh install, you've changed no hardware, its the first activation and its not installed on more than one computer. The system doesn't turn round and call you a liar, it just gives you a code. Technically its a violation of your EULA but the same thing happens for activating XP, Vista and recent Office by phone - its possible to re-use the keys and Microsoft let you get away with it just by pressing the correct buttons. Even if you do need to speak to somebody in person they'll just want the first six digits of the Installation ID, a quick "first time activation?" and a "installed on more than one computer?" check then you get your code.

Product activation used to be a lot tighter than it is now, Microsoft seem to prefer automating it as it saves staffing the lines with real people who have completely indecipherable first names and are obviously reading from a script. "Thank you for calling Microsoft, my name is <some foreign sounding name that you can't understand anyway>, may I have the first six digits of your installation ID please?"

I'm on vista now. Its gonna take a bit of time familiarising myself with it. I got one of those £349 Acer laptops from tesco. Its a bit nice you know although it seems a bit slow compared to my old xp laptop ( R.I.P).

So who's gonna run a book on how long it'll take me to bust this one?

I give it until 7pm tomorrow night and something being spilt on the keyboard (again)

Odd are 10-1 on 19:00 hours 16/11/07

On the earlier subject of windows genuine advantage, office advantage annoyed me so much that I bought Office 2007 student for £80 off amazon. And then was directed by a friend to this site http://www.theultimatesteal.co.uk

I presume MS have realised that their prices are so high there is no way students would ever pay for them and therefore are tempting them to part with at least some cash via this.

Obviously amazon had their order from me canceled and i got that instead,

No-one tried "Open Office"?

Yes, but I already had a working copy of Microsoft Office and thought that was better.

Hymagumba wrote:On the earlier subject of windows genuine advantage, office advantage annoyed me so much that I bought Office 2007 student for £80 off amazon. And then was directed by a friend to this site http://www.theultimatesteal.co.uk

I presume MS have realised that their prices are so high there is no way students would ever pay for them and therefore are tempting them to part with at least some cash via this.

Obviously amazon had their order from me canceled and i got that instead,

Why does OGA irritate you - it only stops you from using templates (all crap) and getting updates (all unnecessary for anything other than an OS)...?