Eh? Walmart sells OEM versions?

Comments

  • Wow.. that is strange.
  • to quote walmart "Take advantage of the security and convenience of a OEM version of Microsoft XP. If you have ever had to reformat a hard drive, you know you can't do it without an OEM version of the world's best OS, Microsoft XP Pro."

    odd, as many times ive formatted hard drives i never used it .....
  • Well... I think they may mean if you buy an OEM computer that won't let a non OEM cd format it... I suppose my dell may do something like that if I tried, I just use the home edition that came with it.
  • They do that now?! I've heard of OEM diskcs not installing on nonOEM machines (Fish has a Dell CD like that), but OEM machines not taking standard install dics?! I can't see MS letting that happen.

    -Q
  • Hmm. Which reminds me, will my Gateway OEM CD work in any other PC, or will I have to hack it first?
  • Well it ends up with Microsoft gettting to sell two OS versions per
    machine. I guess it's for people who buy computers where the
    manufacturer doesn't include a copy of the original OS for you.

    Sometimes just a cobbled up version that's stored on your hard
    drive in a partition that's in the way of a clean install and can be
    lost by formatting. I lost my special partition and they gave me
    nothing to reclaim my right to the OS.

    Thump
  • That's why I won't buy an HP or Compaq. At least I can edit some text files on my CD and have a clean version.
  • nightice wrote:
    That's why I won't buy an HP or Compaq. At least I can edit some text files on my CD and have a clean version.

    HP and Compaq DO give you a CD, you just need to look for the computers that give you the CD. My HP laptop ( i bought 1 yr ago) came w/ a WinXP Home SP1 disk.

  • HP and Compaq DO give you a CD, you just need to look for the computers that give you the CD. My HP laptop ( i bought 1 yr ago) came w/ a WinXP Home SP1 disk.
    I can't say for sure about Compaq 'cause I only bought one a long
    time ago and will never buy another.
    My latest HP did not come with a disk. Instead it had a 5 gig
    restore partition as the very first partition on my hard drive.
    I accidently destroyed it a long time ago.
    I don't know when they quit giving the disks but I bet yours is
    a little older than mine.

    Thump
  • My dell came with a cd, it won't boot in my HP, but it would boot in my pentium... as it isn't any specific brand... maybe it was confused.
  • Thump wrote:

    HP and Compaq DO give you a CD, you just need to look for the computers that give you the CD. My HP laptop ( i bought 1 yr ago) came w/ a WinXP Home SP1 disk.
    I can't say for sure about Compaq 'cause I only bought one a long
    time ago and will never buy another.
    My latest HP did not come with a disk. Instead it had a 5 gig
    restore partition as the very first partition on my hard drive.
    I accidently destroyed it a long time ago.
    I don't know when they quit giving the disks but I bet yours is
    a little older than mine.

    Thump

    I think that HP quit giving away restore Cds i believe to stop piracy. My compaq computer is 3 years (give or take) and it came with the win xp disk
  • my desktop is 4 years ond and came with an OEM cd for dell dimension 4100, i tried to put in on a compaq
    that didnt work
  • ugh.... OEM im ashamed to own one (fail)
  • I think there's some minunderstanding about what we mean by
    "came with a disk."
    What I'm saying is they don't come with the OEM version of the OS.

    I only ever had one computer that came with the OEM disk. It was the
    OEM disk of Windows 98SE and I've used it on many computers. the
    brand of computer was "My Favorite PC". It also came with a restore
    disk that had the correct drivers installed.

    Even though you get the OEM version installed and have a right to it,
    you can only copy the Cabs to be able to reinstall or install it on
    another machine. They never send you the OEM disk or a driver
    disk.

    My last E-machine came with a Norton Ghost Disk Image.
    They don't include the OEM on purpose but not because they're
    afraid of piracy, especially XP. They just don't bother even
    though you've paid to have it when you bought the machine.

    guzzle.gif
    Thump
  • I had one OEM Windows CD - the Windows 95 "companion" CD, which came with the HP. It also came with the entire hard drive as shipped from the factory zipped up and put on a CD - it was bootable and the restore program would format the drive and unzip the archive. Remember, this was 1997.

    My friend has an HP. They sent him 7 CDs (after he called them up), and I have no idea how they work, but maybe like my old HP. They crippled the first one - removed the EULA - so you can only access the recovery console.
  • nightice wrote:
    They crippled the first one - removed the EULA - so you can only access the recovery console.

    Evil lazy ppl!

    -Q
  • There are 2 types of OEM discs in this world, those fresh from microsoft, and those fucked up by oem manufactuares.

    I have an OEM win2k cd, it WAS from dell, but dell done nothing to it. so, i can use it on any system.
  • My Compaq ME OEM disk can work on ANY system. You just have to read one of the README's and WinRAR to extract the files you want from the ZIPS.

    Easy CD, Win ME, Works 6, AOL, and all that shit
  • Iv got a OEM CD
  • So...where does he work?

    -Q
  • Q wrote:
    nightice wrote:
    They crippled the first one - removed the EULA - so you can only access the recovery console.

    Evil lazy ppl!

    And they removed most of the files in i386 to make it unusable for pretty much anything else. He happened to delete the recovery partition (actually, I think it was the Staples repairmen) so he can't get the default HP config for any reason he may want it. So, now he has to warez XP (he's getting Corp, I think, as I type) or use Linux (he actually asked if it was possible to dual-boot them, so he seems interested).
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