Microsoft Licensing Primer
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My whole point for bringing up Software Assurance was for the savings on a single purchase vs the upgrade license. SA for an OEM licensed machine purchased within the past 90 days is cheaper than buying an VL Upgrade, Plus you'd be granted access to the new VL media during your term.
It was never my intention to imply that the OP should purchase SA for everything, as @Jason said, unless you're planning on keeping everything current on old hardware (rare), SA would be pretty pointless.
That said - I do personally believe in SA for the server side.
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@Dashrender said:
My whole point for bringing up Software Assurance was for the savings on a single purchase vs the upgrade license. SA for an OEM licensed machine purchased within the past 90 days is cheaper than buying an VL Upgrade, Plus you'd be granted access to the new VL media during your term.
How is it cheaper over the long term? You have to keep paying for SA. You buy a VL once.
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@JaredBusch said:
How is it cheaper over the long term? You have to keep paying for SA. You buy a VL once.
Maybe my understanding is wrong then.
Hopefully @Chris will throw his two cents in.
It's my understanding that anything that becomes available via SA is yours to continue using even after your SA expires.
So if you get Windows 10 VL during your subscription, you can continue to use it after it SA is over - you just don't get any new versions.
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The Windows 10 upgrade makes no sense to me, and causes a ton of extra work.
There has to be an easier way for them to do it.
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@BRRABill said:
The Windows 10 upgrade makes no sense to me, and causes a ton of extra work.
There has to be an easier way for them to do it.
Pay for the upgrade is the easier way.. If you want it free you have a little work.
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@BRRABill said:
The Windows 10 upgrade makes no sense to me, and causes a ton of extra work.
There has to be an easier way for them to do it.
It's not about them making it easier, it is about you choosing between paying for the easy way or putting up with the inconvenient way. An easy way is available if you want to license it.
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@scottalanmiller said:
It's not about them making it easier, it is about you choosing between paying for the easy way or putting up with the inconvenient way. An easy way is available if you want to license it.
I am learning that is the way of licensing.
Er, Microsoft licensing.
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The general idea of the free upgrade is for home users, not business users. We're lucky that business users can even take advantage of this upgrade. Microsoft could have said that this upgrade only applied to Windows 7 Home or Windows 8.1 Home editions. But they didn't, I consider myself lucky.
If you were on XP Pro and wanted to go to Windows 7 Pro, you had to either purchase a new machine with 7 Pro on it, or purchase Upgrade licenses (either FPP or VL). Paying though did allow you to use images instantly - but again... .you were paying.
As others have already mentioned, if you want that quick solution, open your wallet.
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That's all licensing. It is the basics of products. Someone makes a product that you want that you exchange money for. If they come up with more stuff to sell to you, you can pay more for it. No different than an upgrade on your car to get a nicer stereo or whatever. They make those options so that you can decide whether to save money and live with an anaemic stereo or to spend more and pump up the jam.
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@Dashrender said:
If you were on XP Pro and wanted to go to Windows 7 Pro, you had to either purchase a new machine with 7 Pro on it, or purchase Upgrade licenses (either FPP or VL). Paying though did allow you to use images instantly - but again... .you were paying.
That we get free upgrades of any kind is a very new thing and a big deal. Apple does this but only because you are buying their hardware, too. MS does not have that revenue advantage.
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It is really no different than Windows Desktop vs. Windows Server. We pay more for Server but it is just the desktop OS with functionality unlocked. All about paying for the features that you use.
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Many companies charge us extra for network licences from a license server (floating licences) vs a stand alone ones. Some of these are even $1,000-$1,500 more per seat than an normal standalone seat. It's about what they can sell the ease of use at.
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JetBrains charges a big premium for floating licensing too.
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I wonder how long until Windows OS is included in Office 365...
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@brianlittlejohn said:
I wonder how long until Windows OS is included in Office 365...
It is, more or less. Has been for a while. You get InTune, which is technically part of the O365 suite, and select the upper tier and Windows is included.
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Hmmm.... Haven't looked into that before....
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What' the main advantage of inTune? Their AV? The fact that it's the mobile version of WSUS? now included OS upgrades?
Why would someone buy it?
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Very few people do. It's an odd duck of a product. Central, hosted management of AV, OS upgrades, it's really mostly around mobile workforces. If you have AD internal you would not likely go down the InTune path. Most of what it does is built into other things.
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Last thing on DESKTOPS...
OEM is tied to the machine you purchased it on/for. (Since you can also buy OEM licenses from places.) You cannot transfer the license, not can you restore a backup image from OEM Machine A to OEM Machine B.
What about VL, and FPP?
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@BRRABill said:
What about VL,
VL is tied to the license it upgrades. So you....
- Buy an HP dx5150 desktop.
- It has an OEM copy of Vista
- That OEM Vista is tied to that desktop
- You VL upgrade that Vista to Windows 8.1
- That VL is tied to that OEM license
- The transitive property means that the VL is now tied to that hardware by association.