For those interested in buying windows 8 before the price jump.

[bryster126]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832416562

$30 after a mail in rebate.

FYI, it's the upgrade version, so i don't think you can clean install.

[lutzee]

You need a windows 7 PC to update, But its still a good value for those who want it :)

[GoodBytes]

No, It's Windows XP, Vista and 7.

You can do a clean install with the Upgrade disk

[BenHTBDT]

No' date=' It's Windows XP, Vista and 7. You can do a clean install with the Upgrade disk[/quote']

Note: I MAY BE WRONG. Apparently MS may have been telling their reps wrong info to tell to stores!

You most certainly are correct. Its the full retail version of Windows 8. There is no such thing as an upgrade disc with Windows 8. Despite what NewEgg has listed in their description.

There's 3 mainstream ways of buying windows 8.

1. Retail Windows 8.

2. Retail Windows 8 PRO.

3. OEM/ SYSTEM BUILDER versions of the above two.

Retail > OEM/SYS BUILDER

The only time you're "allowed" to use the cheaper OEM/System Builder is if you're building your own pc, or running a VM.

Retail version you can do all of the above, as well as upgrade an older version of windows.

This is a VERY common misconception that a LOT of "techy" people make.

I'm a MS Advisor at Staples and one of the conference calls we had to be on with Microsoft talked about this for about 30 minutes. They don't want people buying the cheaper OEM version unless for specific use cases, as it doesn't come with support and what not. The retail can do anything you want it to, but its more expensive. Bear in mind, right now Retail is cheaper, but it will hop up to above OEM.

I know this for a fact personally because I've installed the retail copy of Windows 8 Pro that was on sale (the same sku as the NewEgg "upgrade") on a customer's custom built PC that did not have an OS on it.

Hope this helped clear up any confusion.

[davidjkuhr]

No' date=' It's Windows XP, Vista and 7. You can do a clean install with the Upgrade disk[/quote']

Note: I MAY BE WRONG. Apparently MS may have been telling their reps wrong info to tell to stores!

You most certainly are correct. Its the full retail version of Windows 8. There is no such thing as an upgrade disc with Windows 8. Despite what NewEgg has listed in their description.

There's 3 mainstream ways of buying windows 8.

1. Retail Windows 8.

2. Retail Windows 8 PRO.

3. OEM/ SYSTEM BUILDER versions of the above two.

Retail > OEM/SYS BUILDER

The only time you're "allowed" to use the cheaper OEM/System Builder is if you're building your own pc, or running a VM.

Retail version you can do all of the above, as well as upgrade an older version of windows.

This is a VERY common misconception that a LOT of "techy" people make.

I'm a MS Advisor at Staples and one of the conference calls we had to be on with Microsoft talked about this for about 30 minutes. They don't want people buying the cheaper OEM version unless for specific use cases, as it doesn't come with support and what not. The retail can do anything you want it to, but its more expensive. Bear in mind, right now Retail is cheaper, but it will hop up to above OEM.

I know this for a fact personally because I've installed the retail copy of Windows 8 Pro that was on sale (the same sku as the NewEgg "upgrade") on a customer's custom built PC that did not have an OS on it.

Hope this helped clear up any confusion.

Actually if you bought one of the windows 8 pro upgrade keys for $15 after buying a new windows 7 pc or bought an upgrade key with disk from a retailer it is locked to upgrade only and will not activate after being installed on a low-level formatted or newly blank drive. The reason for this is that during the beginning of the install, the windows 8 installer will look to see if a previous version of windows exists on the drive before upgrading or formatting and will set a flag in memory that is later written to the registry during install. If that flag is not set after windows 8 is installed it will not accept the upgrade key for activation and windows 8 will start in a limited trial mode until it can be activated. The key is what is locked to an upgrade version not the disk. You can find more info about this here: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-windows_install/windows-8-activation-after-clean-install-does-not/01047349-516a-485f-b88d-68c1c9ac0e9c

Your choices to install an upgrade key version of windows 8 on a blank drive are:

* Re-install your old OS (XP, Vista, or 7) and perform an upgrade

* Re-install windows 8 upgrade over the top of the install of 8 you just did

* Or edit the registry after install as follows:

1. Run the registry editor (regedit)

2. Find the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup\OOBE

3. Change the value for 'MediaBootInstall' from 1 to 0

4. Open an elevated command prompt (run as admin)

5. Run the following command: slmgr -rearm

6. Reboot

Activation of an upgrade key should now work.