Are refurbished copies of windows, trusted?

The Boke

The Boke

The Boke

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Hello all,

On Amazon.co.uk http://www.amazon.co.uk/Windows-Professional-64-Bit-Refurbished/dp/B00XWCS00U/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1441152617&sr=8-3&keywords=windows+7 You can buy a refurbished copy of Windows 7 professional for under 30 quid.

Has anyone any experience in buying a refurbished copy of Windows?
The description says that it is genuine and you get a genuine product key and I would hope that because it is on a site like Amazon it is trustworthy. But are they?

Are downloads like this worth the money, trustworthy and legit?

Thanks for your help
Boke.
 
Pretty much at the mercy of how genuine the seller is and 9 times out of 10 they are just shuffling around keys obtained under somewhat grey area circumstances until people get one that activates long enough to go away.
 
I work with Refurb licences all the time at work since we are part of the Microsoft Refurbish Program. They are meant to be for machines which have had a previous OS COA on them (sometimes none at all which does happen) and then this new refurb licence gets put on once the machine has been refurbished (basically fresh install plus drivers etc).

My advice therefore would be not to touch this with a barge pole! Even with a refurbished licence you still get a COA to put on the machine in question.

Stoner81.
 
I had a 32 bit key which I then used on a 64 bit version and activated fine (W7) this was home premium.

you cannot use a Home premium key to activate a professional or ultimate version of W7 as ultimate and professional cost more than the home premium version.

I installed W7 Home premium which was activated them upgraded to W10 Home activated and then done a clean install of W10, skipped both keys and then activated once online
 
Just because it activates today doesn't mean it's a legal key.

They're often msdn keys which get blocked after too many activations.
 
OLDPHART said:
Hi, if you go online you can download legal Win 7 ISO-

Link > http://www.w7forums.com/threads/official-windows-7-sp1-iso-image-downloads.12325/

All you need is a key, if you are using win 7 already just use that key if your disc is damaged, should work with the ISO version.
Click to expand...



You can't seem to download them anymore ? Microsoft has stopped that it seems, is there any other way to get them ?


Windows 7 Direct Download Links, Official Disk Images from Digital River

Windows 7 used to be available for public download on servers owned by Digital River, Microsoft's service provider for e-commerce. As of February 2015, these downloads have been pulled. "Free" access to the OS disk images is somewhat limited now, but a few options remain.
Important Note February 2015

The download servers msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net, msft.digitalrivercontent.net and azcdn01.digitalrivercontent.net have been taken down, and all Windows OS downloads have been pulled from the Azure storage.

http://www.heidoc.net/joomla/technology-science/microsoft/14-windows-7-direct-download-links
 
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bledd. said:
Just because it activates today doesn't mean it's a legal key.

They're often msdn keys which get blocked after too many activations.
Click to expand...

They're almost always MSDN keys in my experience. Work fine for a week, a month, a year, basically long enough for any chance of a refund from the seller to expire, then the key is blocked by MS. Nice little scam.

N.B. I've bought COA + keys that activate fine and they're still working years later, pulled off decomissioned laptops and whatnot I believe. Its a definitely a lottery though.
 
Blackjack Davy said:
N.B. I've bought COA + keys that activate fine and they're still working years later, pulled off decomissioned laptops and whatnot I believe. Its a definitely a lottery though.
Click to expand...

Whether they work or not is not really the point though, as they are still not legally licensed keys.

Just for the record I would also avoid these Amazon keys.
 
Anywhere selling a cheap Windows key has to be getting them from a non-standard source, i.e. grey market, MSDN etc.

r/microsoftsoftwareswap (or something like that) usually has a fairly comprehensive list, and the prices are ridiculously low.

Thing is, for those people that MS never get onto, it's fine. For those who find that their keys don't work any more, not so much.
 
Jim99 said:
Thing is, for those people that MS never get onto, it's fine. For those who find that their keys don't work any more, not so much.
Click to expand...

Even if MS don't catch you using one of these dodgy keys, you're still paying good money for an unlicensed copy of Windows. You're no more licensed than someone who's downloaded a pirate version, but you're paying for the privilege!
 
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