Obtaining multiple Licenses

[DeclaredInsane]

Greetings. A friend of mine is asking me to help him setup an internet cafe. I've heard of volume licenses for operating systems and other software. After 2 days frustration I'm here.

I'm wanting to purchase volume licenses for windows 7 home and microsoft office 2010 for 8 pcs. I've been to microsoft licensewise tool and after 3 hours to get the tool to work, it's not available in my country. So I select the closest but it's showing that it'll cost me $60,000. Buying single units is less than this! So something is wrong, I can't find any help. Hopefully someone else has done something like this? Or is there another way?

Help deeply appreciated!

 

[DeclaredInsane]

Tried again it shows $6,500 but single units would cost only $2,600! I thought volume licenses are cheaper? So I must be doing something wrong here...?
​

 

[DeaconFrost]

I'm not sure if you can get a volume license, aka VLK, for that few and make it cost effective. I have some ideas, but answer a question for me first. What computers are you using...8 that you build, or 8 OEM systems?

 

[Petey7]

Volumn liscencing is cost effective for larger businesses. An internet cafe would be best using regular liscences.

 

[DeclaredInsane]

Yes DeaconFrost 8 pcs that I built. So it's better to buy the retail?

So how many pcs does 1 VLK service? just because I'm curious?

And I've been fixing peoples PCs but they always supply the OS, can I then buy VLK and install that on their PCs for those that don't have or those that have pirated copies?

 

[DeclaredInsane]

Thanks a mill for your advice guys!!!

 

[rraod]

oem licences are generally cheaper than retail and you could buy 8 of them for OS. The only caveat is that you will get no support from Microsoft.

 

[pparks1]

Volume licensing is not what you want. For my shop, with around 300 desktops, running Windows, Office and various other MS systems (like Exchange, Sharepoint, SQL) and the Visual Studio tools our enterprise agreement which provided these tools costs us around $200k a year for our licensing with software assurance. We actually just discontinued this agreement at the desktop level as we are entitled to run up to Office 2010 and Windows 7 on all 300 of our desktops. Continuing with Software assurance for $200k a year only really provided us the ability to upgrade later on to Office 2012 and Windows 8. We figured we could just buy retail licenses for the handful of machines which would need to do this, or get OEM licenses with desktops/laptops from Dell and save tons of money.

 

[DeaconFrost]

Yes DeaconFrost 8 pcs that I built. So it's better to buy the retail?

For a business, you would have been much better off going to Dell, opening a business account, and buying 8 identical systems. The discounts you would have gotten would be cheaper than you'd do by building, and you would have had the OS included as well, not to mention a defined warranty term.

It seems that people make VLK license out to be something confusing and complicated. It's one key that a company can use for all company-owned systems. That wouldn't be cost effective for the cafe, nor would it be legal in your other option, as you can't give out those keys for computers not owned by the business in question.

I manage 30 desktops in my small company, so we have a MAK key. That stands for Multiple Activation Key, and it is valid for the 30 licenses I bought through a resller for non-profits.

 

[Layback Bear]

I talked to my friendly Intel dealer about this subject. He builds hundreds of computers for school all over the county and uses the VLK. From my understanding trying to use VLK for such a few computers you are talking about would not be dollar smart if Microsoft would sell such a small license. You mentioned that many customers come in with not so legal operating systems on their computer. You need to stock your shelves with a lot of retail versions. You have a built in market. Your post #5.
What country are you at?