Surface - Office RT "not" licensed for business use

[Steve21]

Not sure if this is commonly known, or one of these things that's been hidden away but the version of Office that Surface RT comes with isn't available to use in business (and guessing if it's the same as normal office schools? ), it's a home/student license edition only

 

Can I use Office Home & Student 2013 RT for work or business?

As sold, Office Home & Student 2013 RT Preview and the final edition are not designed for commercial, nonprofit, or revenue-generating activities. However, organizations who purchase commercial use rights or have a commercial license to Office 2013 suites can use Office Home & Student 2013 RT for commercial, nonprofit, or revenue-generating activities..

 

Seems you need to buy additional licenses to use the "free software" that comes with it...

 

Another reason to wait for the Surface Pro it seems

 

Steve

[Arthur]

Another reason to wait for the Surface Pro it seems

If you buy a copy of Office 2013 (Standard or Pro Plus) for your Surface Pro, that would enable you to use Office Home & Student 2013 RT in a commercial environment on your Surface RT. Problem solved!

 

http://i.imgur.com/megrN.png

[jamesfed]

Ive said it before and Ill say it again - Surface RT is for personal use, all ARM tablets that are out at the moment are for personal use in fact.

 

Now Windows 8 Pro with a x86 processor...that's another thing

[sted]

Ive said it before and Ill say it again - Surface RT is for personal use, all ARM tablets that are out at the moment are for personal use in fact.

 

Now Windows 8 Pro with a x86 processor...that's another thing

 

but again it seems to be aimed at end users not business or you would be able to deploy "apps" to multi users multi pcs and manage the start screen pin items from gpo its the start of ms's push towards byod which im not sure is a good way to go

[gshaw]

Still really disappointed with this but that's the cynical business world we live in sadly

 

So saying you use your single user RT at home then decide to take it in to work as a BYOD device, is the version of Office going to refuse to connect to Office 365 without a license upgrade?

 

Now it says 365 covers a commercial license so I wonder how MS will play his, does your 365 license cover the staff to use any personal RT device commercially or is this another VECD type ripoff in the making?

[Steve21]

Still really disappointed with this but that's the cynical business world we live in sadly

 

So saying you use your single user RT at home then decide to take it in to work as a BYOD device, is the version of Office going to refuse to connect to Office 365 without a license upgrade?

 

Now it says 365 covers a commercial license so I wonder how MS will play his, does your 365 license cover the staff to use any personal RT device commercially or is this another VECD type ripoff in the making?

 

I'd guess it's like this (note guess):

 

Your company buys licenses for Office (365/2013/volume etc). If you have 100 licenses, You can run 100 work pcs, 0 tablets/BYOD.

or 90 work pcs, 10 tablets/byod etc etc.

 

Aka, It'll use a license "officially" to be able to "upgrade the RT"

 

Steve

[Arthur]

Your company buys licenses for Office (365/2013/volume etc). If you have 100 licenses, You can run 100 work PCs, 0 tablets/BYOD or 90 work PCs, 10 tablets/byod etc.

Bad guess.

 

Office Home & Student 2013 RT Commercial Use Rights

The license terms that apply to your use of this product are the following:

 

Additional Terms:

1. You must assign each license to a single device.
   
2. This license modifies your right to use the software under a separately acquired Office Home & Student 2013 RT license, by waiving the prohibition against commercial use of the software.
   
3. If you acquire Office Home & Student 2013 RT commercial use rights under an Office Professional Plus or Office Standard license, you may permit the primary user of the Licensed Device to use a separately licensed copy of Office Home & Student 2013 RT as provided here.
   
4. Except for the allowance for commercial use of the software, all use remains subject to the terms and use rights provided with the Office Home & Student 2013 RT License.
   
5. Acquisition of the Office Home & Student 2013 RT commercial use rights does not create or extend any warranty or support obligation under the Office Home & Student 2013 RT license.
   

MicrosoftProductUseRights(WW)(English)(October2012)(CR).docx

[Steve21]

Bad guess.

 

Isn't that the same as what I said?

 

1.You must assign each license to a single device.

3.If you acquire Office Home & Student 2013 RT commercial use rights under an Office Professional Plus or Office Standard license, you may permit the primary user of the Licensed Device to use a separately licensed copy of Office Home & Student 2013 RT as provided here.

 

So it's one license per device, whether or not a tablet/RT so as I said?

 

Steve

[Arthur]

Isn't that the same as what I said?

No. If you have 100 x Office 2013 licenses for PCs (or FTEs in the case of EES), that means you have 100 tablets that can use Office RT commercially (as opposed to none or 10 - which is what you said). The commercial use rights are an addition to your standard Office license.

[Steve21]

No. If you have 100 x Office 2013 licenses for PCs (or FTEs in the case of EES), that means you have 100 tablets that can use Office RT commercially (as opposed to none or 10 - which is what you said). The commercial use rights are an addition to your standard Office license.

 

you may permit the primary user of the Licensed Device to use a separately licensed copy

 

So where are those seperate licenses from then? Surely under the way you're saying it, you have an unlicensed version as you haven't assigned it a license.

 

Steve

[Arthur]

So where are those separate licenses from then?

The license for Office Home & Student 2013 RT is already include with the purchase of the Windows RT tablet.

 

The text you quoted from point 3 is only for the various Office 365 subscriptions because these have limits on the maximum number of users (except Enterprise) and the number of devices each user can use with their account. If the subscription lapses, your commercial use rights for Office RT go with it.

 

http://i.imgur.com/jZJB4.png

 

If you buy Office 2013 Standard or Pro Plus through a volume license agreement (for example), then you would either have to purchase the commercial use rights separately or they would be included as part of the agreement depending upon whether you go for EES, Select, Select Plus, Open Value etc. etc. That's how I understood it.

 

However, organizations who purchase commercial use rights or have a commercial license to Office 2013 suites can use Office Home & Student 2013 RT for commercial, non-profit, or revenue-generating activities.