ultimate / enterprise

fadedrs said:

but it is possible?

It wouldn't be an upgrade from Ultimate to Enterprise as you aren't getting new features. You are simply on a different licensing model.

I cannot see why anybody who has Ultimate would want to change licensing to a different version. What am I missing.

I think we are missing how and where he got a copy of Enterprise.

CarlTR6 said:

I think we are missing how and where he got a copy of Enterprise.

True, but either way he acknowledges that he already has Ultimate and it's running right? So...why the desire to now switch to Enteprise? That's the part I don't get.

no i dont have a copy of it, i am just curious about it. i am and always will be running ultimate on my home pc. and i never said i had a copy of enterprise!

fadedrs said:

no i dont have a copy of it, i am just curious about it. i am and always will be running ultimate on my home pc. and i never said i had a copy of enterprise!

We have to wonder, why you are asking about this "special" version of Win7, and since there are copies of Ent. out there on torrents... and you are asking what is difference. We are assuming that perhaps you have, or are thinking about dl an illegal copy. Since a volume license can be installed on thousands of machines again and again; it isnt needed, or necessary at the home or small office level.

I have access to many versions of Win7 thru my job, but Enterprise isnt necessary since I have Ultimate, and access to all the legal Win7 Pro copies I'll ever need. I work in education, and my college is a member of MSDNAA.

The real difference is licensing as stated before, and a VL license copy of Ent. shouldnt be floating around out there in the wild. <--- That's why we are all so curious about your reasons for asking!

if the key is the only diff than there is no point, as everybody has stated. i was just wondering if it possible (i dont know as much about 7 as i do about XP and vista), i do not have nor will i have a copy of enterprise. like i said was just wondering about it.

i just saw something posted about enterprise on a website and was curious about it, and microsoft has nothing posted on the 7 website about it, so i was curious about it.

CarlTR6 said:

I think we are missing how and where he got a copy of Enterprise.

No mystery anyone can have a copy of Windows 7 Enterprise direct from MS:

Windows 7 Enterprise | Trial, Evaluation, Test, Download

Maybe it is just curiosity if an upgrade can be done. I compared all 3 DVD's, trail, ultimate, and non-trial enterprise. They are all the same except for 2 or 3 files. I am sure that all has to do with licensing.

Darryl Licht said:

We have to wonder, why you are asking about this "special" version of Win7, and since there are copies of Ent. out there on torrents... and you are asking what is difference. We are assuming that perhaps you have, or are thinking about dl an illegal copy. Since a volume license can be installed on thousands of machines again and again; it isnt needed, or necessary at the home or small office level.

Luckily you can’t do that anymore (well I never say can’t I am sure someone can get around it but it is more difficult). MS change Enterprise VL keys and how they work. I won’t go into long detail, there are many post here that do, but the short and skinny of it is you get a MAK key to start that key has a set limit on installs. Once those are exhausted you have to install a KMS server. The KMS server needs a key. If some tries to use one that is posted on the internet (say it is my companies key) one of two things will happen. If I already have a KMS server up and running it will tell you the key is used. Most people stop there. If you call Microsoft they will ask you a bunch of questions on how come the key is not working even though they see your server is up, and then tell you they cannot help you because you do not seem to be the owner of the key. If I have not used the key and I call MS about it they will soon find I am the real owner and disable the KMS and the MAK keys and reissue me new keys. This reduces the likelihood of someone stealing or using a VL Key.

Maybe there are several different types of keys, because we have one key for our enterprise version used in the classrooms and no KMS Server. We also reimage our classrooms several times per semester.

You most likely have a MAK key with a number of installs attached to it but, since you are re-image classroom machines those are the same hardware over and over and should not be an issue and do not count against your install number. That is good to know that re-imaging is working correctly. We have not had to re-image any Windows 7 machines so far.