XP Pro Question

Hyper · 25 May 2006 at 00:46

Hello All

Just bought a copy of Windows XP Pro as an OEM product with a COA sticker. It is brand new and works perfect but I have a question.
On the COA sticker it has written on this "Windows XP Professional 1 - 2 CPU OEM Product" does the 1 - 2 CPU mean it can be used on 2 pc's or does it mean this version of windows supports dual core.

Thanks.

Craig321 · 25 May 2006 at 01:24

Could mean one of these:

Can use on two PCs - doubt it as the copy you bought would most likely be a single version for use on one PC.

Or maybe they mean that you can use it on computers with 2 CPUs??

But then again, why on earth would they limit the ammount of CPUs you're allowed to have in the computer? So it could mean you're allowed to use it on 2 PCs.

Craig.

philio16 · 25 May 2006 at 01:32

As far as I'm aware it is just for use in 1 or 2 processored computers, not 2 seperate computers

Craig321 · 25 May 2006 at 01:32

philio16 said:
As far as I'm aware it is just for use in 1 or 2 processored computers, not 2 seperate computers

Sounds right, but I'm still not sure why they'd give you any limit at all on how many CPUs can be in the PC??

Craig.

SiriusB · 25 May 2006 at 02:41

Craig321 said:
Sounds right, but I'm still not sure why they'd give you any limit at all on how many CPUs can be in the PC??

Craig.

It's Microsoft and their strange voodoo. Enough said, really.

SiriusB

Burnsy2023 · 25 May 2006 at 10:53

philio16 said:
As far as I'm aware it is just for use in 1 or 2 processored computers, not 2 seperate computers

This is correct. Also note that a dual core processor only accounts for one of these and so you could have a quad core PC on that licence.

MS have done this to stop this version of XP pro being used on machines that are most likely doing mission critical work in businesses and therefore should pay the extra in OS software.

Burnsy

stoofa · 25 May 2006 at 11:00

It's 1-2 CPU's inside a single machine - not "Up to 2 machines, 1 CPU each".
This 1-2 CPU has appeared on COA's since WinNT 4 BTW.

If you want to run the OS on a machine with more than 2 CPU's - say 4 then you'd need to run the Server version of the OS.
For 8 CPU's you'd need the Enterprise version of the OS.

Before you start getting all anti-MS (which I'm sure some will) be thankfull MS don't license on a per processor basis for OS's which some companies do for their applications as things get very expensive!

Burnsy2023 · 25 May 2006 at 11:47

stoofa said:
It's 1-2 CPU's inside a single machine - not "Up to 2 machines, 1 CPU each".
This 1-2 CPU has appeared on COA's since WinNT 4 BTW.

If you want to run the OS on a machine with more than 2 CPU's - say 4 then you'd need to run the Server version of the OS.
For 8 CPU's you'd need the Enterprise version of the OS.

Before you start getting all anti-MS (which I'm sure some will) be thankfull MS don't license on a per processor basis for OS's which some companies do for their applications as things get very expensive!

Generally if a machine has more then two physical processors then it'll most likely be used for a server application anyway. I doubt anyone with a quad processor machine has been caught out by this so its not really an issue.

Burnsy