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what is the cheapest way to get oem copies of windows xp?

B

brian_riendeau

Platinum Member
i was thinking about building and reselling some computers. i have been regsitered as a microsoft oem system builder for years now. thru oem.microsoft.com, oem copies of windows xp are roughly the same cost as if i buy them right from newegg. if i wanted to buy 20 copies of windows xp home to start off, what would be the best way of going about this? i am sure some people here have been in this situation before so i decided to ask here. thanks for any help and advice.
 
Actually there probably aren't that many people here that have ever needed to get large numbers of OEM copies for resale.

If you're looking to do it all legally and without any possibility of going against Microsoft licensing, you should ask Microsoft. As far as I know, they're the only place you can get OEM licenses to Windows and stay within their licensing guidelines (according to them, buying an OEM copy from Newegg is not a valid license even for your own use, let alone reselling it). Remember that Microsoft doesn't let you "buy a copy" of their products, you're only buying a license to it, and an OEM is only buying a license to install it on a computer for resell, and the consumer is only buying a computer with Windows preinstalled, they're not even buying a Windows license as Microsoft sees it.

You're probably not going to get any cheaper than newegg though, unless you can convince them or some other dealer to give you a bulk price, which they may not be willing to do.
 
Oops. You mean legal copies. hehe.

I was going to say the cheapest way is to burn a copy of XP Corporate that you borrow from some high school kid. He is liable to have a dozen sitting around. Ask him for one that has been slipsteamed to SP1. While your are borrowing, be sure to get a key generator, and don't use the FCKG-... key.
 
>As far as I know, they're the only place you can get OEM licenses to Windows
> and stay within their licensing guidelines (according to them, buying an OEM
> copy from Newegg is not a valid license even for your own use, let alone reselling it).

Are you sure? I thought they were legal if sold with an OEM machine. If not, MS is overlooking
thousands of resellers openly doing this, which is hard to believe.
 

go to www.microx-press.com, order 20 copies of XP oem and 20 ide cables. You'll be all set and 100% legal. This is a loophole in microsofts licensing and microsoft IS aware of it and doesn't really care.
 
Microsoft does care, but can't do anything about it. They'd like people to believe that it's illegal, and it does violate their licenses in a way, but they know that they can't enforce it, so they just tell people it's against their licenses and hope that at least some people will believe the FUD and buy retail copies. Microsoft's EULA is essentially an unenforceable contract, that they just hope nobody will fight in a big way.

I never said it's illegal to use OEM copies, I just said it might not be in line with Microsoft's will. If I was doing a lot of reselling, I'd be doing my best to avoid the possibility of a lawsuit. If I just build a computer FOR someone else, with their specs, then I'll use OEM stuff as much as I can, but not if I'm advertising myself as an OEM/VAR.
 
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