OEM vs Retail

Hi everyone,

I've found out that OEM versions of XP and Vista are cheaper than Retail versions, so what's wrong with them? Which are the differences?

And by the way, I've seen that Vista Home Basic only support one processor. I have a core duo, so, does this mean that the OS will only use one processor? And what about programs that run on it, will they use one or two processors?

And one last thing, I'm thinking of a dual boot PC, with XP Home 32 bit and a Vista Home Basic 32 bit (I won't buy this one ). Is this possible? Do I need two hard drives, or with one hard drive and two partitions is enough?

Thanks,

Prototype00

Per your dual boot question, I have xp and Vista prem on dual boot with 2 hdd's and all is good there.

You can run with just one hdd with partitions, but with the price of drives so low you can save a few bucks rather than buying a good partition manager.

Plus, if you can go with Vista premium instead of the basic edition. You get alot more for your money.

There's a comparison chart on MS's website as to what features each OS has: MS Vista Comparison Chart

As to the Core2 Duo question... I'm not sure how much more plainly I can put it... but look at it this way. It's one single chip in the palm of your hand, right? It plugs into a single socket on the motherboard, correct? That means it is ONE physical CPU. It can have 32 billion cores, but it still only plugs into one CPU socket, making it one physical CPU. Now if you had two chips that plugged into two sockets on the motherboard, then you would have TWO physical CPUs. Disregard the number of cores when discussing how many CPUs you have. All editions of Vista support multi-core single CPUs.

To the best of my knoweldge, all versions of Vista and Direct x10 go hand-in-hand.

Hello, and am very interested in this thread. Will be purchasing equipment soon with the ability to choose Vista or XpSp2.

1) Can the OEM version be 'custom installed' or is it an all or nothing proposition?

2) I notice that Home Basic does not have a lot of the 'sharing' capabilities that, frankly lead to a lot of spy/vir/mal problems, and this at least superficially, 'looks' safer.

3) Like the many elder systems before it, can I make a copy of the boot sector (reportedly about 1.5 gig?!?!?) in case S#1T happens? (probably on a DVD at that size)

4) I notice that in other forums, not in this posting yet, anyways, that aero is quite the resource hog for its slick appearance.

5) Apropo to 4) is that the less DRM built in, the less time wasted protecting it. (makes me think the 'other' sysops in a dual-boot should be W98se!)

6) No matter what I purchase, I will just say no to OutEx/Mail, and fetch my mail from the mailserver my self.

So I guess what my real question boils down to is if I can custom install, and to what fineness can I do this. I have heard that OEM's are full install only, no customization.

Thanks
f61

So if your motherboard dies with the OEM version, do you just have to buy a whole new copy or is there some mechanism to be able to use it with another motherboard?

I have the OEM version of Vista 64 bit Ultimate. While I haven't changed much in the way of hardware since I originally got it, I have had zero problems reinstalling the OS 3 times.

I think a copy of your hardware profile or MAC address is stored on MS computers somewhere and associated with your key. Because the third time I reinstalled the OS, it didn't even bother to tell me to activate it.

Basically I removed everything of use to a secondary drive, then completely blew away the Vista system partition and reinstall it. I thought the retail SKU contained copies of the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the OS but only allowed to you install one or the other.

Since I knew I was going 64-bit from day zero, I went with the cheaper OEM version.

I read somewhere that you can only install vista so many times before that key is disabled for good. Is this just a myth from people who hate M$.

Dual-Booting Vista and XP with OEM XP + OEM Vista Business upgrade:
Just tried to do this by using the Vista DVD and a separate hard drive (XP already installed on another HDD). I took the "clean install" route (not installing XP on the 2nd drive, installing vista on the 2nd drive and waiting until after the install to activate Vista). Unfortunately (maybe obviously) an attempted activation returns an error that says something like 'this key can only be used as an upgrade.' Well, that settles that. I'll try to install XP on that 2nd drive and see if they let me activate it and upgrade it to Vista (dual boot) while still keeping XP active on the first drive (anyone know if this will work?). I know it says in the link that assman posted that OEM only allows 1 copy on 1 computer, but I wonder if anyone has actually tried to do this OEM-to-Vista-upgrade dual boot deal.

You're welcome, I wish you a pleasant Vista Experience

Nope, I own a Vista Ultimate x64 OEM as well, My mobo died today and vista required another activation which has failed online but i just phoned them up and it was sorted within minutes.

There is a set amount of activations you can for a set time. I don't know the exact number but you can not activate the same vista twice in a month, not automatically anyway, you have to phone them up.

The OEM version allows installation on one, and only one computer.

The Retail version can be uninstalled and moved to another PC.

If you consider "A DVD and a Pamphlet" to be everything in thd retail box. <grin> Then yes, it's the same in both cases. Software's the same.