Can you sell a used windows licence?

[DarkManX]

I Just purchased WHS2011... Will be upgrading my WHS2003 machine. As I no longer have a use for 2003, can I pass the license onto someone else? I assume its legal, but will MS activate it for the next person?

 

[lxskllr]

You can sell upgrade and retail licenses. The buyer could have an issue with autoactivate, but a call to MS would clear it up.

 

[corkyg]

This may help you decide.

http://www.microsoft.com/oem/en/licensing/sblicensing/pages/licensing_faq.aspx#faq2

If you are upgrading from one version of software to another, the upgrade requires that you retain the original because it is part of the upgrade. To be safe, do as ixskllr suggests, - call Microsoft.

 

[DarkManX]

WHS2011 is not a upgrade version. They are both full OEM licenses.

 

[lxskllr]

WHS2011 is not a upgrade version. They are both full OEM licenses.

I don't think you can sell them. I mean you /can/, but you'd be violating the terms. Also, it could be irritating to the recipient unless they were a techie, and knew how to deal with it.

 

[DarkManX]

I don't think you can sell them. I mean you /can/, but you'd be violating the terms. Also, it could be irritating to the recipient unless they were a techie, and knew how to deal with it.

I assume anyone installing WHS2003 on a custom system is a techie. I suppose I can explain that in the auction. As long as im im not violating any MS terms and making the license invalid.

 

[lxskllr]

I assume anyone installing WHS2003 on a custom system is a techie. I suppose I can explain that in the auction. As long as im im not violating any MS terms and making the license invalid.

I think you would be. I'd consider that grey market software. It can usually be worked around, but it isn't completely legit.

 

[DarkManX]

So do I sell it or not? lol

 

[lxskllr]

So do I sell it or not? lol

From my point of view... It cost about $100 new, right? You probably got $100 use out of it, so you're even money. I'd give/sell it to a friend I could help with any hassles, but I wouldn't be comfortable selling it to a stranger. I stand behind everything I sell, and I wouldn't want someone having a bad experience because I wanted to bend the rules. Friends can be dealt with, but you could potentially be screwing a stranger.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Once OEM software is activated on one motherboard, it cannot be re-activated on a different motherboard. You have to purchase a new license.

So, if you want to sell the OEM license, then you would have to sell the motherboard that it is tied to, in order to make it legitimate.

 

[DarkManX]

I dont believe WHS2003 is currently for sale, I paid 60-80$ for it a few years ago. I also think there is a large demand for it because of the significant changes in WHS2011 that took away the best feature of WHS03.

 

[ultimatebob]

Yeah... OEM licenses are tied to the hardware they were activated on. So, no, you can't resell it.

Now, if it was a retail boxed copy, that's a different story.

 

[Chiropteran]

You can't sell the license.

You could, however, sell "WHS2003 media and activation key"

I'm not a lawyer, but this is what common sense tells me.