D&C GLug - Home Page

[ Date Index ] [ Thread Index ] [ <= Previous by date / thread ] [ Next by date / thread => ]

Re: [LUG] Old PC for toddlers playgroup - Exmouth

 

Simon Robert wrote:
why worry about the terms of the licence. Install virtualbox and use the
licence number on the side of the machine or the side of the dead
machine. if you need to find a new copy of windows borrow an install
disc or download a copy from pirate bay. It's not like you've stolen a
copy as the licence would otherwise be unused.
Because it's a business presumably, it's not as if it's a home user who would get away with it. It only takes the Business Software Alliance (who I hold in the same regard as PRS) to investigate and make an example of the nursery, i.e. fines, plus the cost of a license to boot.

I don't think we should be promoting piracy on the list, even if it's only technical piracy (I know it's silly that you can't transfer the license, but that is Microsoft, if you don't agree to the EULA then don't use it, same as if you don't agree to the GPL, don't use it).

There is also the fact that a lot of the time, the license keys on the side of the machines don't actually work. My wife has got an IBM Thinkpad with XP Home, when I came to reinstalling it from an OEM Windows XP Home disc, it wouldn't accept the key, despite the fact it was a legitimate key which was stuck to the machine. Nowadays the majority of pre-installed machines have a mechanism where the BIOS is locked into the copy of Windows, there are some exceptions however such as when my Dad upgraded from Vista to Windows 7 and HP sent a valid key which he had to use to activate Windows. In the odd cases where they key is valid, chances are Windows is already activated to a specific hardware set and changing the hardware will require re-activation and a bit of explaining to Microsoft.
There is quite a lot of educational software for linux, but the stuff
they're used to is probably not among it. There is edubuntu which might
be worth a look. So linux and wine is an idea, or linux and crossover
office. Crossover Office has a trial version and may well run stuff wine
won't, or would be difficult to set up with wine. You could try both and
might at the end find that crossover is worth Â34 (maybe if you
contacted codeweavers, who make it, they might cut you a deal seeing as
what you'd be using it for). Crossover is really easy to use. Maybe
edubuntu with crossover installed.
Yep, with the beauty of having a trial version available, if it does work then Â34 is going to be cheaper than a one off copy of Windows.

It's a shame it's over in Exmouth otherwise I'd have happily gone over with my laptop and given the stuff a try on Wine.

Rob


--
The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG
http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list
FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/linux_adm/list-faq.html