The people getting screwed here are the enthusiasts, like many people here. You have a system now....you but vista and pay some ungodly amount for it. Soon you find your system just isnt up to the new effects and all, so you build a better system canabalizing your old system.....you have just used your one and only vista instalation trasfer.....hope you never have to upgrade that mobo again.

The average schmoe is fine since they tend to buy boxed systems, until they find out they cant transfer that 'ultimate edition' upgrade to the new system DOH!

With all the years of piracy of Windows. I guess this comes as no suprise to me.

I'm not going to lie to you. I never purchased a single copy of Windows during my lifetime, and I think I started on Windows platform in 1995.

I was always able to burn/install from a work copy at home and it was never an issue.

I was going to buy Vista this time around because I owe it to Microsoft. Even with them enforcing bigger restrictions I will still buy it. I've cheated them long enough. While they are creating a headache, I guess the only person I have to blame is myself. But honestly. Its not that big of a deal. If I plan on building a new machine. I'll just buy another copy of Windows. That way if I do a "hand me down" like I typically do to family members, they also have a legal copy of Windows.

There's always a first, and you can't agree to something if you haven't even read the EULA. Those companies that say you agree to the EULA when you open the box are completely bogus.

Why do you think some of use are over reacting? You're prepared to buy a new copy of Vista Ultimate every two hardware upgrades?

I'm really looking forward to Vista. Currently Running RC1 and I'm quite pleased with the improvements over XP.

For those who play games Vista is a god send. Also of note is Microsoft's new "Games for Windows" push.

The EULA is presented upon software installion, where one must make a conscious decision to agree to it. At this point, whether it's actually been read or not is a personal problem.

Vista is Microsoft's product. If one does not like it, there is an old tried and true way of showing them how you feel about it where it hurts: buy and use a competitor's product.

As a way around the hardware upgrade issue, it just requires some adjustment in the planning phase, namely in going long term with the main parts like the motherboard. I doubt Microsoft is going penalize anyone for doing the minor upgrades like swapping video cards, increasing ram, etc.

I complain NOT because I think M$ has no right to their IP. Rather, I complain about the product pricing.

M$ makes 80 percent clear profit on the OS, I have read. That is far beyond the 10 percent of most manufacturers. They can do that because they have a near monopoly (as defined by their market share and other factors -- a monopolist does not have to have 100 percent or 0 competition to be a monopolist).

In the past, huge near monopolies (selling a product that people need) that take advantage by egregious overcharging have been broken up or become publicly regulated. I could see a movement for this. But, as I said, M$ has more than enough cash to buy the politicians and judges.

If MS was charging $50 to $100 retail for their various Vista versions, I would not be complaining -- and, they would still be making a lot of money.

Thank you. This makes me feel better about paying atleast a couple grand USD for Microsoft products in the same time period.

They don't have a true monopoly IMO. So they can charge as much as they want. Doesn't mean they'll get it.

A true monopoly would mean (in my view) that there would be NO alternative to them. Like in the case of my province, we can buy power from ONLY one source. So that's a monopoly here, a sanctioned one at that. Sure I can go buy a wind generator, solar panels, batteries, spend a small fortune doing that, yadda yadda, but that's not very practical or cost effective. It's not really an option to me.

Now with an OS, in the year 2006 it is, for a surprising number of people. Like non gamers or business folks.

Red Hat, Ubuntu, etc. are free, the price is a download or cd purchase. Ubuntu is a snap to install and almost every machine I've tried it on, it's detected my hardware and ran (even on old Pentium IIs).

Sure there will be business people tied to M$ products for custom applications. I'm tied to it for games. If Linux ran ALL my games I'd switch in a second.

We have real options, just not many of us are exercising them. Again, if publishers can make LINUX versions of there games, I'd switch, no problem. That would mean $200 I'd have for more games!

In a sense I have, I bought a console. XP will run most games I own now or intend to buy for the near future, so Vista can wait. I'm curious about it, isn't anyone with something new? However if VISTA doesn't run my software, I'll pass.


The other point is that they EULA "issue" and that interpretation of it is being debated and refuted. I'll wait to hear M$ stance. I don't believe the tweekers and up-graders will be caught in some sort of EULA jeopardy.

If it was up to me eula's would be outlawed

I'm talking about some software products that say you agree to the EULA before you even read it. They put a sticker on the box saying you agree to the EULA when you open the package. That's what I'm saying is completely bogus. If I read the EULA and don't agree with it no store will take it back anyway because I've already opened the box. It's a friggin' catch22!

One big problem with that concept. NO OTHER OS CAN RUN MY GAMES! You see, Microsoft came up with this idea of DirectX which is closed source. If all game developers had used open API's like OpenGL, OpenAL etc. it would be a different story. See how it works now?

I've ran the beta too. Ever play the game MOO3? That's what Vista reminds me of. Some things are needlessly buried ten layers deep. I was looking for the icon to add/remove programs in control panel and they changed the name to some stupid thing that says nothing about removing programs. WTF did they do that for? Some things they changed from XP just make no sense at all. It is a stupid design made for noobs who need to be hand held. I like XP much better and the only reason I would even consider Vista is purely for DX10 games. But I'm willing to forfeit any future DX10 games because I won't be buying Vista with their current license agreement. I've got enough PC games already to last me the rest of my lifetime and I have the 360 if I feel like buying something new that I can't get for XP. Plus I already have Linux on another PC so telling me to get another OS is a wasted effort because I already did that years ago. And it's a great OS that can do anything Vista can do except run all my games, unfortunately.

Good point. I remember paying about 90USD for Win95 when it came out. The new pricing is obscene. Average Joe just doesn't have that kind of spare cash to justify this type purchase.

And? You're going to allow MS to maintain a firm grasp of your privates over games? If you insist on sticking with Windows for games, then game developers will insist on continuing to develope games for Windows.

Personally, my next computer will have Linux on it (I finalized on this today as I browsed the Apple section in CompUSA). I already have several games that will run on it, including a couple flight sims (X-Plane and Flightgear).

How about some facts to go along with all the speculation:

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/winvista_licensing.asp

Well, in fact - if the developers would develop for both the OpenGL and DirectX APIs, life would be better for gamers that don't want MS Windows but rather go with an alternative such as Linux...

Oh, I see, so I am the problem for buying games that only run on Windows. Like 99% of all PC games? I've been running Linux for about five years already so don't get your point. There's only a handful of premium games that will run on it. But I do use it with Dosbox to run old dos games.

You call those facts? These are facts.

From XP EULA:

4. TRANSFER-Internal. You may move the Product to a different
Workstation Computer. After the transfer, you must
completely remove the Product from the former Workstation
Computer. Transfer to Third Party. The initial user of the
Product may make a one-time transfer of the Product to
another end user. The transfer has to include all
component parts, media, printed materials, this EULA, and
if applicable, the Certificate of Authenticity. The
transfer may not be an indirect transfer, such as a
consignment. Prior to the transfer, the end user receiving
the transferred Product must agree to all the EULA terms.
No Rental. You may not rent, lease, lend or provide
commercial hosting services to third parties with the
Product.