My small business has 2 desktop and 1 laptop in which I have installed Win7 activated with daz. Some days back I got emails from Microsoft appointed consultant that our company was nominated for SAM audit. I did not answer and their person came one day to check. They are now asking me to buy 3 licenses of Windows. Is this legal? Do I need to do this? They are asking for invoices to prove that Windows is legal. If I just say I have lost the invoices, can they prove the OS is pirated? Or should I buy the 3 licenses. The only good thing is that we don't use MS office by Libre so no problems there.
Yes I already know but I just wanted to know if that machines are OEM (HP, Compaq, Toshiba, etc.) then they came with an original Windows version/edition, if so then just re-installing that precise version and edition you don't need to buy anything because that licenses are already paid when you purchased your computers.
No the Dell laptop came with Ubuntu and 2 assembled PC's came with nothing. Normally in India people use assembled PC's only not OEM's
I guess Home Premium vs Professional for your small office environment, the first will do the job and it's more inexpensive.
I am not sure why you let them in ... not sure about the laws of the country you are in but.... "Some days back I got emails from a Microsoft appointed consultant"??? ... I somehow doubt this. Did you check with Microsoft this company is authorised to act on there behalf? And do they have the court order to perform a regulatory audit on your business assets??? Even if they are working for M$, M$ are not the "law" and you surely could just ask them to leave. You have no requirement to prove your licences to a 3rd party I think unless ordered to do so by some court of law. Here in the UK I worked for a company that got an email from FAST (Federation Against Software Theft) asking to come in and check our licenses for compliancy. We had all legal licences, but I did not see why I should need to prove that to them - who are infact a private company and not law agency. I just replied we had no requirement for there auditing services. They are just fishing for possible sales. On the grounds they are a sales company, and not from M$ I think they are trying to extort money out of you. You do NOT need to purchase licences form them. Also an invoice is NOT the same as a licence, plenty of ways where you can legally buy windows and not get a paper invoice. I am not saying you should use illegal software in business environment, but I dislike bullying tactics. If they show up again refuse them entry.
Maybe you can just uninstall DAZ during inspection. It's not illegal to use a Microsoft software without any licence since you can legally install it without licence.
Yeah, I know, but maybe in 30 days he could switch over to Linux, and tell the goons he didn't like windows anyhow.
LOL too much of a hassle, don't you think? I'd rather pay for those licenses, in the very end my business should pay back that investment.
Ask yourself if you'd rather be sued or just buy a 3 licenses of windows? ... I mean you should know yourself what's much cheaper and much less of a hassle. Microsoft doesn't care if you are pirating Windows on your home PC, but they care if you pirate windows in your business and you can be sued. I doubt they would actually sue you as 3 licenses are too little of a "damage" to really gain anything from it but then again you really shouldn't play with fire, pirating Windows in business is dumb as hell.. im sure you can afford to pay for what you use, if you don't need windows go back to ubuntu.
They are genuine, a large company actually. But I am sure they have no legal backing. However, I don't want them to keep sending mails and take some legal action in future. I want to get over with this. It is bullying and shot them a long mail asking number of questions and also blaming Microsoft for the piracy problems. Told them that they don't shut down torrent sites or YouTube videos which carry all instructions but are going after a small business like ours. But the truth is they came thinking we have many PC's probably > 25. Seems they got some wrong information. Maybe if I tell them to get out they will not bother for the small no of licenses but it's more of my own conscious which is making me take a decision to buy a license or 2. Yes, agree. Probably going to do that only. Normally I buy all my laptops pre-installed but last year I was not getting a laptop anywhere with Win7 Pro. MS and laptop companies wanted me to compulsorily buy Win8.1. It was frustrating. So I put a pirated version in laptop too. I agree to some extent. However the cost of Windows in just too high for a country like India. I checked up prices of Win8.1Pro in MS store in USA and India. It costs $199 in US and about $220 in India, where the salaries are a tenth of what people earn in USA. So this is really not fair and the main reason for piracy. I wrote this also in my mail but no reply of course. In India, an engineer starting with a small company like ours will not even get this much amount as a monthly salary! People can maybe buy 1 license but not multiple. That's never going to happen at this price point. But MS does not want to understand. Somehow we got in their scanner and hence I will buy some licenses and resolve the issue. I have a couple of Linux installations too for backup use but just cannot make it as a desktop as it's not user friendly for the normal user and doesn't really communicate well with other Windows computers on the network. It's too much of a headache to setup for a single person like me, for use in peer-peer network.
Some years ago I endet up with to be sued on court forced by BSA in Thailand. Seems to be that those auditing companies using all the way, so the BSA! Fact were, after not let them in to our office, it just was ned a couple of hours and they were back with an Court Order and a plain clothed police officer. That whole were end up in Court a few month later and had cost a lot of money: the Fine, cost of the court and our Laywer. If I had let them in, it would have cost just a fraction of what we had to finally tp pay. Since, my company and I are under survilance and get checked from time to time so I refuse to use any pirated Software again by using legal stuff only! OK, BSA didn't looking for all properties of all software companies (in Thailand), just the bigger like Microsoft, Autodesk, Apple, Adobe, Oracle, SCO and so on. Those small developers couldn't afford to let other do the re-search for them like the BSA do. But, if the BSA come checking and they found illegal use of software from even small developers, they will in form those dev's and give out thye data of the offenders. That said, once they got you, be careful what you do in future!!
Three Windows, 1 Corel Technical and 1 Adobe CS!! For that I was need to go to court, and another about 15 or so were settled by just buying the Licenses. Most expensive by the way , beside of the Fine, were Adobe, three times the Licenses fee! Since I didn't use Adobe anymore! Microsoft were quite generous, instead for a total of 12 pirated Windows and Server OS'es they sued me just for three. That's an reason why I still use as much as possible from MS! That never any software will be 100% perfect, I still would say that Microsoft is trying to do a lot for it's customers and even (illegal) users.