Can i resell MS software?

philjayj · 5 Nov 2007 at 13:12

Hi everyone, hopefully you can help.

I have a retail copy of MS Office 2003 Pro. It has been installed on just one PC in the past, but is no longer in use and is not installed any longer.

As I am not using the software anymore, can I resell it?

Many thanks

Phil

Burnsy2023 · 5 Nov 2007 at 13:15

Yes, you can resell RETAIL or UPGRADE licences only. This isn't the case with OEM licences which are non-transferable

Burnsy

philjayj · 5 Nov 2007 at 13:48

Thanks for your help Burnsey, much appreciated.

Amp34 · 5 Nov 2007 at 14:10

But what about when you sell a whole PC, I assume you can sell it with an OEM version built in? And as Microsoft class the motherboard as the PC does that mean you can sell an OEM version of, say Vista, with the motherboard it was installed with?

Cromulent · 5 Nov 2007 at 15:01

Amp34 said:
But what about when you sell a whole PC, I assume you can sell it with an OEM version built in? And as Microsoft class the motherboard as the PC does that mean you can sell an OEM version of, say Vista, with the motherboard it was installed with?

Technically that wouldn't be transferring the license as Microsoft license their software to run on a specific computer. Hence the protection schemes they have built in to track hardware changes. If they licensed the software to the person rather than the hardware then I would assume that their protection scheme would be setup in a slightly different way.

That is the way I understand the licensing anyway.

Burnsy2023 · 5 Nov 2007 at 15:14

Amp34 said:
But what about when you sell a whole PC, I assume you can sell it with an OEM version built in? And as Microsoft class the motherboard as the PC does that mean you can sell an OEM version of, say Vista, with the motherboard it was installed with?

Good question, simple answer:

Your transferring ownership of the licence, not the licence itself, therefore you can legally sell any OEM software as long as it is with the said computer.

Burnsy