Windows

Paco22904 · October 25, 2019

Hey, I've heard many different opinions about windows keys and was wondering what's actually safe to get? Is saving the money worth it or is going with an OEM license worth it?

Paco22904 · October 25, 2019

1 minute ago, Genwyn said:

Oem license keys come with the risk of Microsoft finding the key list that was used and sold and then deactivating all those keys. It happens extremely rarely but it does happen. You also don’t really get any Microsoft support if for whatever reason you needed it.

I wouldn’t pay for it anyway, because it’s a shitty product, but considering the price difference is like 10$ vs 100$, even if you on that rare chance get your key deactivated it’s still cheaper to just buy another key.

where's the best place to buy them?

kirashi · October 25, 2019

58 minutes ago, Paco22904 said:

where's the best place to buy them?

Authorized resellers or Microsoft themselves are the best 2 places to buy Windows licenses. Grey market sites reselling OEM keys already assigned to existing OEM hardware violate the Microsoft EULA and don't support the developer of the software, so I cannot recommend them.

LogicalDrm · October 25, 2019

Really up to your own standards how you do it. Personally I pay full price for software. Only exception was when I bought Win Vista after official support for it had ended, for older laptop. Really it was the only option as MS takes older versions out of stores when new arrives. But I've paid full OEM price for Win7 key which is base of my desktop PC. Win10 OEM price for Home Edition is still about same, at $90.

warrenr · October 26, 2019

On 10/24/2019 at 10:13 PM, Genwyn said:

A lot of people use g2a as well.

At their own risk, mind you. There are many, MANY documented circumstances of people buying keys from G2A, Kinquin, etc., only to find that the key is invalid at purchase time, or the key becomes invalid at a later time. While it's not the end of the world if that happens, it still sucks and instead of having a nice day, you're going to be running around dealing with that nonsense.

In the long run, the best thing to do is just pay for the damn thing. Windows 10 Home is $139 or thereabouts these days, which isn't cheap, but it's also going to outlast just about every other component in your system, and it's the only thing you'll buy for your computer that improves itself over time.

You can also try using a Windows 7 or Windows 8 key -- Microsoft doesn't advertise it, but they do still offer free upgrades to Windows 10 just by using an older product key.