TechNet Subscription

Gman · 24 Nov 2006 at 17:26

Anyone know anything about this ? or actually have a subscription ?

Had a quick look and its £283.00 a year and for that you get access to I think all of Microsoft's products such as XP, Vista, office etc for evaluation purposes without any time limit on the evaluation.

Now when you weigh this up £290 for a year doesn't sound bad considering Vista Ultimate will set you back about £320 ish.

Now my question here is what happens when the 12 months is up and you don't renew ? Does your software keys get canceled or what or is it just that your access is removed from Tecknet but the software you've already got is still fine ? Just seems a gray area as they class there downloads as evaluations which to me says trial.

From what I can make out it's similar to an MSDN account so any of you guys on MSDN know if you product keys expire once your MSDN account is canceled ?

ruffneck · 24 Nov 2006 at 18:29

err, Im pretty sure they do have a time limit on evaluation isn't it 180 days?

Gman · 24 Nov 2006 at 18:44

only thing I can find in the FAQ is this

All TechNet Volume Licenses expire with the license agreement enrollment. Open License subscriptions are 2 year subscriptions effective from the date they are recorded through Microsoft Licensing.

is based on that I assume they do run out them, either at the end of the sub or within 2 years of the sub start.

ruffneck · 24 Nov 2006 at 19:10

I think some software available through technet don't expire, but most do have a grace period which is normally 180days, I haven't tried anything apart from the server software and they have always been 180days grace

Gman · 24 Nov 2006 at 19:37

right will give that idea a miss then MSDNAA it is then

philjayj · 24 Nov 2006 at 20:32

I was speaking to a Microsoft contact who works for the TechNet division - from what he told me, all operating systems, such as Vista, XP and server OS's do not have a time limit.

From what I gather, when TechNet was first launced, the 180 day limit did apply, however, it has recently been scrapped.

What I wasnt able to find out though is, after you have used up all the installations a product key allows, can you definately request more keys?

Phil

stoofa · 25 Nov 2006 at 03:45

TechNet is not designed as a way to get around licesning and the need to buy your MS software.
Read the license agreement for TechNet and you'll see that just because there is now the lack of 180 days hard-limit on the software you can't just buy it and use the OS indefinitely.

As for Ultimate costing £320 - have they actually released the price of the Retail upgrades yet?
Last time I checked they hadn't - insider info?

Gman · 25 Nov 2006 at 12:55

stoofa said:
TechNet is not designed as a way to get around licesning and the need to buy your MS software.
Read the license agreement for TechNet and you'll see that just because there is now the lack of 180 days hard-limit on the software you can't just buy it and use the OS indefinitely.

As for Ultimate costing £320 - have they actually released the price of the Retail upgrades yet?
Last time I checked they hadn't - insider info?

thanks mate, no the £320 a mentioned was just a guestimate

but from the T's an C's it seems that the only rule is you can't use it in a production environment or for-profit so where would the average home user come under this as I wouldn't be using it for production purposes or profit.

Freakish_05 · 28 Dec 2006 at 09:55

Thought I'd ressurrect an old thread instead of starting a new one

Gman said:
but from the T's an C's it seems that the only rule is you can't use it in a production environment or for-profit so where would the average home user come under this as I wouldn't be using it for production purposes or profit.

Seems the question above never got answered. Does anyone know where home-users stand on the above?
I'm not in a production/profit environment, unless you count making the odd website

bilston · 28 Dec 2006 at 10:00

As pointed out by Stoofa, it isnt a way to get around buying an OS. If you get a years subs then carry on subscribing however, I cant see how even MS will have a problem with that, even though theyre unlikely to find out either way.

Freakish_05 · 28 Dec 2006 at 10:03

bilston said:
If you get a years subs then carry on subscribing however, I cant see how even MS will have a problem with that, even though theyre unlikely to find out either way.

Indeed, this was my intention...should have made that clearer

Cheers bilston

philjayj · 28 Dec 2006 at 10:10

Does anyone subscribe to TechNet?

PinkPig · 28 Dec 2006 at 10:52

Beware that a home user using a TechNet subscription would almost certainly be on the wrong side of the law - Microsoft consider a home user to be an example of a "production environment". Activities like playing games, writing essays, creating documents of any sort, or even just browsing the internet are considered to constitute "production" as far as the license is concerned.

Of course it's uncertain about what a court's intepretation would be, Microsoft are very unlikely to "find out", and nothing will ever happen to you - but you can fairly realistically say the say about downloading an illegal copy for free. It seems foolish to me to spend hundreds of pounds and still be using Windows illegally.