Vista OEM vs Retail

whats the diff? I thought the activation was a bit more stingy with oem, like changing the motherboard registers as a different pc, so u cant activate it if its changed.

Also, are there limits with how many times u can activate over the net with either retail or oem?

Hi fieseler,

This has been asked once or twice before on the forum , but I didn't see any definitive answer.

Can tell you my experience, and what I have gathered, if that's any help.

I have the OEM dvd, which is Home Premium on my machine. I can reinstall and have it activate online as often as I like.

I believe ( from what I read on an MS site, and if I understood it correctly ) that is the case if it is the first o/s installed on the machine, if not it only activates automatically 5 times , then you need to phone activate. As far as I know, it is the same for retail OEM or full Retail installs.

The retail OEM dvd lets you do the same things, clean install, repair install, startup repair. You don't get free phone support with OEM product, so if you need that , it can be expensive. Also MS offer free ($10 shipping ) replacement media for Retail product. If you get the OEM one, make a bootable backup using isorecorder and keep in a safe place.

Hope that helps

SIW2

Also, 32 bit OEM do not offer by MS free 64 bit upgrade + $10 shipping, but Retail one does.