Printable View
Vista business is the one I decided on after testing a few of the versions, there's not a lot in it though.
I still feel that vista is bloated beyond belief though, I'm avoiding it in the school for as long as possible, hopefully until vista SP2 is out lol!
"Vista business is the one I decided on after testing a few of the versions, there's not a lot in it though.
I still feel that vista is bloated beyond belief though, I'm avoiding it in the school for as long as possible, hopefully until vista SP2 is out lol!"
Then it will just be even bigger. lol
I expect you're right, Geoff. Our LEA still provide XP laptops, so they're still available. The description on the packaging states Vista, they just downgrade them to XP. I don't remember what they COA sticker says.Quote:
Originally Posted by Geoff
They got these from PC World. They just picked up 'consumer' laptops from the shelf, and happily brought them to me Monday morning, then trotted off to the bursars office to get their receipts refunded.
(I posted about this at the time, on FFS, and started a 5-screen ranting thread).
I had a good look round. No joy, though.Quote:
Originally Posted by PeterW
As already mention by a few others, I believe Vista Business will be the most cost effective/appropriate for schools in the longterm.
I also have held off Vista until a later date and at the end of the day, what's the rush? XP will still be around for sometime to come and I believe will be supported up to the year 2011 if memory serves me right.
My prime reasons are that Vista is a lot more resource hungry than XP and interestingly, I had a discussion with someone who recently bought a new laptop with Vista and Office 2003 apparently has "issues" running on Vista. I don't know if this is true, or whether Office 2003 SP3 fixes these issues. Office 2007 does work fine on XP however...
The point is as with any new operating system, application writers always need to play catch up initially. Sure, Vista probably has a compatibility tool similar to XP but the reality is you'll end up replacing the majority of your applications which is even more expense.
As you're also connecting Vista laptops to your network you'll also have to deal with new policies, *.admx files instead of traditional *.adm files. I believe you can only administor Vista policies from the MMC, until Windows Server 2008 arrives which will be much better equiped than Windows Server 2003. At the end of the day it's still all very new and I'd rather use the fast, mature Windows XP SP2 with SP3 on the horizon which will include over 1000 fixes and some Vista functions, XP is here to stay for at least a few years.
My cynical side says that Microsoft will somehow degrade performance of XP machines via SP3 to force upgrades to Vista. :twisted:
I read recently that OEM version of XP is being removed at the end of this year. I didn't notice the date of post. Is this still true? If so then any new hardware would need a license for XP as well wouldn't it?
I am still trying to get my head around all this licensing thing. I called MS to confirm a few things and even they needed to check their facts before telling me whats what.
I was asking about OEM licenses under the VLK and if they can be transferred to different hardware when the origianl hardware becomes beyond help. She said yes. I then explained what i wanted to do was to replace hardware with Mac minis and a copy of Parallels and she said that the machine would need to have an OEM XP license already to use under the VL agreement.
I also read that the OEMs for Vista are backwards compatible with XP but this somehow does not sound right.
I'm interested to hear from someone else who has diferent information or can indeed confirm.
According to this the phase out date for OEM XP Pro is Jan 08. However, I have the destinct memory that it had been extended, but that may be the date it has been extended to...
However, if your machines come with Vista Business OEM then you have downgrade rights to XP - so you can contact Microsoft and they'll sort out XP Pro for you.
On the transfer of OEM license front, I don't believe thats right - you can't transfer them to new machines AFAIK. It goes further than this too. You can upgrade all components except the motherboard without needing a new license, but if you replace the motherboard, for any reason other than defect, then you would need a new license. (taken from here)
Mainstream support until 14/4/2009, Extended support until 8/4/2014.Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael
I thought that OEM licences were bound to the HDD not the motherboard?Quote:
Originally Posted by localzuk
Nope, motherboard - as they are linked to the BIOS. Think how often people upgrade hard disks compared to motherboards... It is much more regular.
My source link quotes the MS OEM site as saying mobo too.
Direct link here - Word doc
So what happens if the mobo manf decides to completely rewrite the bios and send out a flash update? Does that mean you need a new license. A bit of exaggeration i know :-).
When you bought new hardware a few years ago you had no choice but to have an OEM version of XP or whatever so surely you own a license regardless of the hardware you stick on it. You certainly paid for it.
I found yesterday that SCC were selling Toshiba Satellite Pro A200 with either Vista Business or XP Pro. The laptop seemed a bit under spec for Vista but what was interesting is the laptop with XP was nearly £20 more than the same laptop with Vista.
Nope, you don't own a license - you agree to be bound by the terms of the EULA in return for access to that software. You don't own anything. If the manufacturer makes changes to the bios, you will still have the serial number of the mobo on the board - and anyway, you haven't changed your mobo so you are still licensed.Quote:
Originally Posted by HodgeHi
So to buy an OEM license costs money and to use an OEM license costs money. If i buy an OEM license say for a mac mini when purchasing the hardware for parallels and therefore the hardware is emulated, if i wish to move the OEM to a seperate mac mini with the same emulated hardware is this illegal? Is the OEM still attached to the mac -minis MOBO?