I have a legally obtained retail copy of Windows Vista Home Premium (32-bit). Shortly after first purchasing it, I installed it as a secondary OS via Apples Boot Camp utility onto an iMac Aluminum. Later on, I obtained a new Gateway notebook that came with Windows Vista Home Premium (64-bit) pre-installed. Wishing to replace the 64-bit pre-installed version of Windows Home Premium with a freshly installed 32-bit version, I did so using the aforementioned legally obtained retail disc without error. When the time came to activate windows on the new notebook, I was informed that I would have to either purchase a secondary license for the product or activate the product through Microsofts phone activation service. I chose the latter and Vista was up and running with a successful activation soon after. Unbeknownst to me and pointed out later by a friend, this was apparently an illegal means of activating my copy of Vista Home Premium on the new notebook because the Vista EULA specifically denotes that only one computer may be graced with this licensed copy at any time. I am concerned about the legality and/or consequences of this, even though I explained the situation to Microsoft during the activation process and the representative I was speaking with did not seem to have an issue with it. Does anyone have any insight on this? Should I uninstall Vista from my iMac so that only my new notebook is running the licensed copy? I have talked with Microsoft support about this and they succeeded only in confusing me further. Please, Help!
Solved Utterly Confused
- Thread starter VikingJay
- Start date
Hello Jay, and welcome to Vista Forums.
You are correct, it is only legal to have your product key number activated only on one installed instance of Vista. It may work on two temporarily, but as soon as one of them checks in with Microsoft, you will most likely get a non-genuine copy message and be placed in reduced funtionality mode on one of the computers.
You will need to either purchase another copy of the same Vista version and change the product key number on one of the computers with the new number, or uninstall that Vista on the computer you do not want it on anymore.
Hope this helps,
Shawn
You are correct, it is only legal to have your product key number activated only on one installed instance of Vista. It may work on two temporarily, but as soon as one of them checks in with Microsoft, you will most likely get a non-genuine copy message and be placed in reduced funtionality mode on one of the computers.
You will need to either purchase another copy of the same Vista version and change the product key number on one of the computers with the new number, or uninstall that Vista on the computer you do not want it on anymore.
Hope this helps,
Shawn
My Computers
System One System Two
-
- Operating System
- Windows 10 Pro 64-bit
- Manufacturer/Model
- Custom
- CPU
- Intel i7-8700K 5 GHz
- Motherboard
- ASUS ROG Maximus XI Formula Z390
- Memory
- 64 GB (4x16GB) G.SKILL TridentZ RGB DDR4 3600 MHz (F4-3600C18D-32GTZR)
- Graphics card(s)
- ASUS ROG-STRIX-GTX1080TI-O11G-GAMING
- Sound Card
- Integrated Digital Audio (S/PDIF)
- Monitor(s) Displays
- 2 x Samsung Odyssey G7 27"
- Screen Resolution
- 2560x1440
- Hard Drives
- 1TB Samsung 990 PRO M.2, 4TB Samsung 990 PRO PRO M.2, 8TB WD MyCloudEX2Ultra NAS
- PSU
- Seasonic Prime Titanium 850W
- Case
- Thermaltake Core P3
- Cooling
- Corsair Hydro H115i
- Mouse
- Logitech MX Master 3
- Keyboard
- Logitech wireless K800
- Internet Speed
- 1 Gb/s Download and 35 Mb/s Upload
- Other Info
- Logitech Z625 speaker system, Logitech BRIO 4K Pro webcam, HP Color LaserJet Pro MFP M477fdn, APC SMART-UPS RT 1000 XL - SURT1000XLI, Galaxy S23 Plus phone
-
- Operating System
- Windows 10 Pro
- Manufacturer/Model
- HP Envy Y0F94AV
- CPU
- i7-7500U @ 2.70 GHz
- Memory
- 16 GB DDR4-2133
- Sound Card
- Conexant ISST Audio
- Monitor(s) Displays
- 17.3" UHD IPS touch
- Screen Resolution
- 3480 x 2160
- Hard Drives
- 512 GB M.2 SSD
Thank you for the response. It cleared up my misconceptions and I will be uninstalling Vista from my iMac.
Thanks again!
-Jay
Thanks again!
-Jay
My Computer
You're welcome Jay. 
My Computers
System One System Two
-
- Operating System
- Windows 10 Pro 64-bit
- Manufacturer/Model
- Custom
- CPU
- Intel i7-8700K 5 GHz
- Motherboard
- ASUS ROG Maximus XI Formula Z390
- Memory
- 64 GB (4x16GB) G.SKILL TridentZ RGB DDR4 3600 MHz (F4-3600C18D-32GTZR)
- Graphics card(s)
- ASUS ROG-STRIX-GTX1080TI-O11G-GAMING
- Sound Card
- Integrated Digital Audio (S/PDIF)
- Monitor(s) Displays
- 2 x Samsung Odyssey G7 27"
- Screen Resolution
- 2560x1440
- Hard Drives
- 1TB Samsung 990 PRO M.2, 4TB Samsung 990 PRO PRO M.2, 8TB WD MyCloudEX2Ultra NAS
- PSU
- Seasonic Prime Titanium 850W
- Case
- Thermaltake Core P3
- Cooling
- Corsair Hydro H115i
- Mouse
- Logitech MX Master 3
- Keyboard
- Logitech wireless K800
- Internet Speed
- 1 Gb/s Download and 35 Mb/s Upload
- Other Info
- Logitech Z625 speaker system, Logitech BRIO 4K Pro webcam, HP Color LaserJet Pro MFP M477fdn, APC SMART-UPS RT 1000 XL - SURT1000XLI, Galaxy S23 Plus phone
-
- Operating System
- Windows 10 Pro
- Manufacturer/Model
- HP Envy Y0F94AV
- CPU
- i7-7500U @ 2.70 GHz
- Memory
- 16 GB DDR4-2133
- Sound Card
- Conexant ISST Audio
- Monitor(s) Displays
- 17.3" UHD IPS touch
- Screen Resolution
- 3480 x 2160
- Hard Drives
- 512 GB M.2 SSD
I love to see there are still honest poeple around
My Computer
System One
-
- Manufacturer/Model
- gateway/m6881
- CPU
- centrino core 2 duo 2.2ghz T7500
- Memory
- 3GB
- Hard Drives
- 500GB WD
- Mouse
- logitech
- Internet Speed
- fios 35MB not!!!!
Vista Installed with Wrong Product Key
VikingJay owns two Vista licenses and is entitled to the use of both of
them.
The fact that the Gateway has been changed from 64 bit to 32 bit is not a
problem. The Vista EULA is not restrictive in terms of this so long as only
one version is used at a time (per license).
The iMac Bootcamp setup doesn't need to be uninstalled.
All that needs to change is the product key in the Gateway.
In the Gateway, navigate to the System page.
That will be either:
ControlPanel > System
or
ControlPanel > System and Maintenance > System
At the bottom of the System page will be some blue text
that says: Change Product Key
Click on that and a page will come up with a box in which to enter
the Vista product key that came with the Gateway.
Enter the key,press Next etc.
You end up with two licenses and two installs , each with its correct key.
Best Wishes.
Ardneh
VikingJay owns two Vista licenses and is entitled to the use of both of
them.
The fact that the Gateway has been changed from 64 bit to 32 bit is not a
problem. The Vista EULA is not restrictive in terms of this so long as only
one version is used at a time (per license).
The iMac Bootcamp setup doesn't need to be uninstalled.
All that needs to change is the product key in the Gateway.
In the Gateway, navigate to the System page.
That will be either:
ControlPanel > System
or
ControlPanel > System and Maintenance > System
At the bottom of the System page will be some blue text
that says: Change Product Key
Click on that and a page will come up with a box in which to enter
the Vista product key that came with the Gateway.
Enter the key,press Next etc.
You end up with two licenses and two installs , each with its correct key.
Best Wishes.
Ardneh
Last edited:
My Computer
System One
-
- Manufacturer/Model
- Compaq/SR5130NX
- CPU
- AMD AthlonTM 64x2 3800+
- Memory
- 4 GB
- Graphics card(s)
- NVIDIA GeForce 6150 SE