Purchasing additional Windows Vista licenses

For customers who acquired a full or upgrade version of Windows Vista from retail or pre-installed, we've got a pretty sweet deal.  We're announcing the Windows Vista Additional License program, which provides the ability to install the same edition of Windows Vista on any other additional computers you may own.  The program allows customers to purchase up to 5 additional licenses for PCs they own at 10% off the suggested retail price.

Windows Vista requires 1 license per device.  When attempting to install and activate the same licensed copy of Windows Vista on another PC, activation won't work.  When the activation fails, the user is directed to purchase additional licenses online or by phone.  Remember, not properly activating Windows Vista will lead to it running in reduced functionality mode, so this new program is a handy way to avoid that situation.  With it, customers can use their original Windows Vista media for installation and activate each installation using the newly purchased licenses.  This means there's no need to wait for new media to arrive in the mail -- although that option is available in case the original media is lost or otherwise unavailable.

For North America, Windows Vista Additional License online orders opened 19 March (yesterday) and phone orders were available as of 28 February.  For our EMEA friends, online orders will be available on 26 March, with phone orders currently planned for a future date.

For more information on the Windows Vista Additional License program, visit this website.

The program is designed to run through the entire product lifecycle of Windows Vista; thus, no end date has yet been established.

Note that other types of licenses such as Volume Licensing, MSDN, TechNet and evaluation copies do not qualify for the Additional License Program.


Comments

  1. Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 11:29AM  

    Are you guys trying to completely alienate your non-US customers?  I am a UK user and, apart from the (very) widely publicised outry at the hugely inflated retail prices for Vista, we do not have the option of the Family pack to soften the blow.  And now another incentive, the Vista additional licence program, is denied us.  I have three PC's at home.  Despite that Vista Ultimate (albeit full, not upgrade) costs a little more than a Mac Mini, I am expected to buy 3 licenses with absolutely no incentive to do so.  It's like you guys are really not fussed - you guys now how badly the product line is doing over here.  

    Despite waiting years for this product, it has only taken the release of the UK pricing to convince me to swith to Mac.  Thanks a bunch guys.

  2. Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 11:35AM  

    Oops, looks like my anger was premature -- I can't find anything to say that this isn't available in the UK?  Any clarificaton?  We'd still like the Family discount by the way.

    In mitigation, the thing is still overpriced ;-)  I'll now scurry off and stop ranting !

  3. Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 11:38AM  

    This program sounds like a good idea, although a 10% discount is quite small considering that you wont get a retail box.  Maybe if you bought one more license 10% off is OK but if you bought 5 more licenses the discount surely should be more say 33%.  Were talking about home users not bussinesses, 10% to a bussiness is good, but to a home user its not enough to encourage buying... I could be wrong though!

  4. Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 12:55PM  

    wombatmk- "For our EMEA friends, online orders will be available on 26 March." EMEA = Europe, Middle East, and Africa.

  5. Bas
    Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 2:59PM  

    Great job also releasing this for EMEA! Thumbs up, guys.

  6. Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 3:33PM  

    Why BUY licenses for a crappy operating system? Get Linux, comes in a variety of flavors, Ubuntu being my favorite, and guess what? It's more stable, and it's completely FREE! http://www.ubuntu.com/

  7. Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 6:34PM  

    newsscientist2000, if you need that many additional licenses, don't forget that volume licensing is still an option. :)

  8. Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 8:44PM  

    Volume Pricing...Are you kidding! I want to know where I can get a new computer WITHOUT your Vista garabage! I'm sorry guys I really had hoped Vista would be worth it but you went over board with the security and I thought Microsoft wanted to get rid of the pop-ups...you can't do anything...even simple tasks like changing a file name without the constant pop-ups. Please let us control our own damn computers!

    P.s I agree with Kawamura...Get Linux - it's free and a hell of alot easier to use! I run Fedora and Knoppix right from my CD/DVD drive! Don't even have to sweat an install!

  9. Posted on: March 21, 2007 at 10:14PM  

    willebanks, could you elaborate a bit about the pop-ups?  Are you talking the UAC window asking for permission?  Are you logged into an account with admin privileges?  

  10. Posted on: March 22, 2007 at 2:34AM  

    Thanks Terri for advice :-)

Trackbacks

  1. Posted by: links for 2007-03-21 | ITsVISTA on March 21, 2007 at 2:33AM
  2. Posted by: Teamzille.de on March 23, 2007 at 7:51AM

    Im Windows Vista Team Blog wird über ein Programm berichtet, mit dem sich zusätzliche Lizenzen von Windows Vista zu vergünstigten Preisen erwerben lassen, z. B. um einen weiteren Computer mit dem neuen Betriebssystem auszustatten. Um i