Windows 7 Home licenses on new PCs

[gshaw]

Annoying trend I've noticed recently when quoting on PCs is that all of them have come with Windows 7 Pro licenses and it seems more difficult than it needs to be to get the lower licenses. Seems pointless paying out twice when we have EES to upgrade Home > Enterprise... unless on the big brands Pro \ Home work out the same cost once it's all bundled in?

 

Anyone able to shed light on the subject?

[synaesthesia]

All of our suppliers are more than happy to lower the included license to Basic/Home Premium for us - is there anyone in particular you're having difficulty with?

Stone, CP Ltd, Millennium, Millgate etc more than willing.

[3s-gtech]

Just saved a good amount with Misco by custom speccing some new laptops with Home. I guess it depends on what the manufacturer offers too - that was for Lenovo.

[jamesfed]

Most of the big OEMs (HP/Lenovo/Acer) will ship a Pro licence with their business PCs as they assume that most business won't have a Microsoft Software Lic agreement and as such it makes sense to ship them with a 'good to go out of the box' licence.

 

Smaller guys who do custom builds like Novatech, Stone ect are able to ship with the lower lics easy enough though as they can take into account the particular needs of a school.

[gshaw]

Stone have offered Home but prices have shot up quite a bit so having a look around to see what else I can find to see if it's an issue with the market generally... problem is this is only for 10 units so getting custom builds elsewhere is an issue. Looking for £300-£350 a unit but it's proving difficult, in part I guess due to MS ripping everyone off with the Win7 Home licensing and also due to the hard drive prices.

 

What's odd is that the "education" offers still come with Pro... that makes very little sense to me.

 

Found some Lenovo ThinkCentre Edge boxes on offer but they have the same awful Realtek NICs in as one I trialled recently so need to factor in £20 per unit for a proper Intel card instead (odd choice from Lenovo there as they usually put Intel NICs on their boards)

 

Also from another thread I can't see why SSDs are still coming in at a premium considering the HDD price situation, just seen a 64GB Crucial M4 for about £3 difference to a 250GB HDD yet manufacturers are still charging £20+ more per unit for it?

Edited April 25, 2012 by gshaw

[synaesthesia]

Indeed - all our incoming quotes for the 30-40 pc's we need this year are with SSDs and indeed we're finding the same premiums. Self builds are a possibility however that puts a tad more possible strain with the lack of an all-in-one warranty (we always ask for 5 years). We can get 5 years on most parts but if something goes wrong it means we need to diagnose rather than just phone up and say "Oi, it's broken" in a more polite manner

We are finding the raised prices just about everywhere too, it wasn't that long ago since Stone's 30pcs for 10grand offer in which we partook. 60-70 quid a unit more soon adds up.

[DMcCoy]

Home versions aren't valid for volume license upgrades for business, only education. That's why they come with Pro.

[gshaw]

Home versions aren't valid for volume license upgrades for business, only education. That's why they come with Pro.

 

I get that, what I don't like is when manufacturers pretend they're doing deals for education they don't offer the best value by giving us licenses we don't actually need. Microsoft aren't entirely innocent either, a very clever £20 \ unit price increase by dropping the Vista Home Basic SKU and replacing it with 7

 

I'm looking at self build as well, on one hand it doesn't feel like a great idea but on the other I'm getting much better spec for £50 \ unit less hmmmmm

 

Or there's VDI but I'm waiting for a few more people to have it stable before committing big chunks of money to it... 2 servers (minimum), even with DAS, thin clients and Kaviza is still a fair bit to lay out in one go.

[ToyHeartsFan]

I'm looking at self build as well, on one hand it doesn't feel like a great idea but on the other I'm getting much better spec for £50 \ unit less hmmmmm

 

Not all schools have / can afford EES licenses – we don’t but it is something we are considering but only because Microsoft is killing off XP.

 

At a previous school I did once get someone turn up with a laptop with the home version of what ever OS was current, obviously I couldn’t connect it to the network (it was ordered direct from their budget with the permission of the head…).

 

Self build is a bit of a no no, Microsoft don’t want you to do it! EES licensing needs a base OS. You are not an OEM i.e. you are not building then selling the PCs which means you should be buying retail licences if you are building new PCs or upgrading the motherboard. I was thinking about replacing the motherboards / processors in some of our PCs with something better but legally we would need to buy new retail licenses for the OS which makes the whole thing pointless.

 

Ignoring the license costs I doubt you would be able to save much by building your own machines because you are buying in small quantities and not direct from the manufacturers so the margins in it are pretty small. You then have to deal with all the repairs warranty returns when hard drives fail etc…

[gshaw]

Yup already know that... even with retail licenses and better spec (64GB SSD + 4GB) RAM there was a saving of around £50 per unit which even with 10 units isn't to be sniffed at.

 

Probably won't do it in the end as not sure if we have the time to mess around building them but does leave a sour taste in the mouth that the manufacturers are actually paying more for the components than retail so we end up with a lesser machine for more £££. Seems like the OEM supply chain really hasn't caught up with new technology or SSD manufacturers are really missing a trick to kill off HDDs in the business market.

 

A very frustrating situation all round really, the kind of thing that drives me nuts as it's not a technology issue but irritating business and licensing practices

Edited April 25, 2012 by gshaw

[HarryMonkey]

 

I'm looking at self build as well, on one hand it doesn't feel like a great idea but on the other I'm getting much better spec for £50 \ unit less hmmmmm

 

 

Does that £50 take into account your time to build a machine? If not then you're not getting a true picture of the cost.

[ToyHeartsFan]

Yup already know that... even with retail licenses and better spec (64GB SSD + 4GB) RAM there was a saving of around £50 per unit which even with 10 units isn't to be sniffed at.

 

I understand why you are looking at it we are all trying to stretch the money that bit further. I’m surprised you can save £50 per unit; it’s been a while since we purchased any new PCs i.e. March 2011 but back then we paid about £360 for an i3 with W7 pro oem, 4 GB ram and a 3 year warranty. That was with Tempus who since folded when their parent company went down the pan

 

Not having EES licensing would add a fair chunk on for us as well i.e. we would either need to buy the pro version or buy upgrade licences for each machine which would wipe out any saving we would make.

 

SSD drives are getting faster and cheaper and I would like to try one in an old PC to see how much difference it makes but there comes a point when you need to ask if it’s worth spending money on a 6 year old PC ( SSD + Mem upgrade + sata 3 controller + gig lan controller = worth it? Probably not! ). Also even our oldest PCs have 80GB hdds in them so 64GB drives do seem a bit on the small side.

[gshaw]

Does that £50 take into account your time to build a machine? If not then you're not getting a true picture of the cost.

 

During summer it'd be part of the usual works anyway so not a biggie. Like I say probably won't do it but does make you question why a consumer can buy parts cheaper than an OEM system builder but what can you do...

[SYNACK]

Talk to your supplier, we have got hp elite 8200 boxes with 7 home basic and ram upgrades. It is usually a case of getting in touch with a supplier high enough up the chain to get these customisations.

[mavhc]

I tried to get people to sell me laptops with 64GB ssds, no one got back to me. They'll do whatever they can to get some part of the product to have some profit, margins being so small. Can you buy computers with no hard drives or ssds and add your own?

 

I ignore all microsoft licencing terms. As they're too complex for people who work at microsoft to understand, no jury would convict me.

[CyberNerd]

 

Self build is a bit of a no no, Microsoft don’t want you to do it! EES licensing needs a base OS.

 

Does anyone happen to know what qualifies as a base OS and how does this square with VDI?

[synaesthesia]

I shall hasten to add that you, as an end user either at home, in business or in education, are legally able to purchase an OEM licence for the operating system along with non peripheral hardware. So if you purchase an OEM version of Win 7 Home Premium from the same supplier as your motherboards, processors etc, then there isn't an issue.

 

Base OS for EES can be Vista Basic or higher, 7 home or higher. Not sure on starter as it's rather a different OS.

[CyberNerd]

Base OS for EES can be Vista Basic or higher, 7 home or higher. Not sure on starter as it's rather a different OS.

 

So buying EES to go from XP to Win7 isn't going to help as you'd still need the OEM license in addition to EES?

[DMcCoy]

Microsoft Volume Licensing - Windows 7

[CyberNerd]

Microsoft Volume Licensing - Windows 7

 

 

cool. thanks. Basically - if you've already paid for an MS license and you pay again with EES you can upgrade. If you have select agreements then don't buy home/starter.

[DMcCoy]

cool. thanks. Basically - if you've already paid for an MS license and you pay again with EES you can upgrade. If you have select agreements then don't buy home/starter.

 

You'd have to dig out the academic select details, but it's probably the same as the academic row iirc