LAN module: How to ... dissipate a vaporware around ThinBASIC

**kryton9** · 20-09-2007, 02:07

Thanks Mike, I didn't know about that, I always thought OEM was just like the full retail but without any books or maybe support. So thanks for the warning!

It is funny in my last 2 computes I bought, I never got windows OS cd's, but had to burn restore dvd's for my computers. The problem with that is each time I want to do a clean install, it installs all these apps I don't want and I have to spend an hour to remove everything and then start to install what I want, hate that!!

I have also read now on more than one blog, that if you buy a notebook that comes with Vista, you will have the most difficult time installing previous versions of windows as you can't find drivers for the hardware. They had a great sale this week, a notebook for $350, nothing powerful, but more than enough to take around to surf or program on... anyways it comes with vista home, so I started to read about notebooks, vista and putting XP back on and came across these issues, so held off on the purchase.
That is scary that you are locked into one OS when you buy new complete systems now!

**Petr Schreiber** · 20-09-2007, 08:19

Kryton,

regarding XPs - in my country there is action called "Legalise your Windows", which means you can buy relatively cheap XPs OEM without any hardware or PC bundled with.

Full XP Pro: $530
Legalise program : $191

And you must not be pirate to take advantage of this program

.

Bye,
Petr

**Michael Clease** · 20-09-2007, 08:58

This is for anyone that hasnt seen it before. How about XP on a USB DataPen.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/09/...n_your_pocket/

**Michael Hartlef** · 20-09-2007, 11:19

[offtopic]

Kent, OEM versions are valid only for the computer you bought it with. In the beginning the dealers were only allowed to ship them with a computer. On a seperate CD, a recovery CD or like with your computer on a harddrive partion, which then you can burn on to a CD. The harddrive version and the recovery CD are locked to your PC. Nomally you can't use them on a different computer. A few years ago the dealers here start selling OEM versions alone. But still when you install and activate them, they are locked with the computer you did the install first. I changed the motherboard one time and had a very hard time on the phone to convince the nice lady to reactivate my license. Because it was an OEM one.

The thing with Notebooks is, that they run great out of the box. Starting with graphiccard drivers, you won't find the manufacturer releasing new versions of the driver much. Maybe one or two and that's it. Like with NVidia mobile chips you need a modified version to get the NVIDIA drivers installed. And mostlikely the newest driver versions don't run anymore, that is why I'm stucked at my driver version.
But I knew that before I got my notebook.

[/offtopic]

**ErosOlmi** · 20-09-2007, 12:03

Originally Posted by Michael Hartlef

Kent, OEM versions are valid only for the computer you bought it with. In the beginning the dealers were only allowed to ship them with a computer. On a seperate CD, a recovery CD or like with your computer on a harddrive partion, which then you can burn on to a CD. The harddrive version and the recovery CD are locked to your PC. Nomally you can't use them on a different computer. A few years ago the dealers here start selling OEM versions alone. But still when you install and activate them, they are locked with the computer you did the install first. I changed the motherboard one time and had a very hard time on the phone to convince the nice lady to reactivate my license. Because it was an OEM one.

The thing with Notebooks is, that they run great out of the box. Starting with graphiccard drivers, you won't find the manufacturer releasing new versions of the driver much. Maybe one or two and that's it. Like with NVidia mobile chips you need a modified version to get the NVIDIA drivers installed. And mostlikely the newest driver versions don't run anymore, that is why I'm stucked at my driver version.
But I knew that before I got my notebook.

I can confirm all.
Same here with ATI driver and Acer TravelMate 8204WLMi. I can only install ATI driver if released by Acer support system. Official ATI drivers just do not install or in some cases crash the OS.