Office 2008 Deactivation

[secutorum]

I have the Student and Home Edition.

I will be selling the machine that this cd-key's installation resides on. Of course I will be wiping the drive and doing standard OS install. I want to be able to reuse the CD Key on my new Mac. How do I deactivate Office 2008 so it frees up the CD key to be reused on a new machine?

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

MacOffice doesn't use activation in that way. Just wiping the drive is
fine, nothing special to do additionally.

 

[secutorum]

So what you are saying is that once I remove Office 2008 from the old machine and wipe the hard drive, that I am free to reinstall Office 2008 on a different machine with the same CD Key? This doesn't seem right, as the new machine will have a different hardware profile. On Windows, I believe there is a huge painful proceedure in which you have to call MS to basically get a new CD key issued.

I just want to be crystal clear that if I fully remove Office 2008, that I can install, activate and use it on a brand new machine???

 

[CyberTaz]

Although it *is* a violation of the EULA, the fact is that you don't even
need to wipe the other drive. There's nothing [other than your conscience]
to prevent you from installing Mac Office - using the same key - on as many
different systems as you wish. You simply can't run Office concurrently on
more than one of them if they're connected to the same network.

Removal, of course, is the *right* thing to do & I, for one, applaud your
integrity

 

[John McGhie]

Yes, you are correct on both counts.

Microsoft Mac software does not yet employ the high-encryption software
activation needed on Windows. Apparently, Mac users are less likely to
steal software than Windows users, so Microsoft has not switched activation
on.

The procedure on Windows is not at all painful Most of the time,
Activation will simply work. The software will automatically prompt to
activate as soon as you launch it when you are on the Internet. It takes a
few seconds, and that's all there is to it.

The only time you have to make a phone call is if authentication fails.
Which it can if you make a major change to the hardware after installing.
Then it's no big drama (well, the hardware failure may be, if it's your hard
disk that died...) but the Microsoft Activation Centre will just read you
back a new activation key and you're good to go.

Of course, if someone has bought a bootleg copy, they will have a problem


Hope this helps

So what you are saying is that once I remove Office 2008 from the old machine
and wipe the hard drive, that I am free to reinstall Office 2008 on a
different machine with the same CD Key? This doesn't seem right, as the new
machine will have a different hardware profile. On Windows, I believe there is
a huge painful proceedure in which you have to call MS to basically get a new
CD key issued.

I just want to be crystal clear that if I fully remove Office 2008, that I can
install, activate and use it on a brand new machine???

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Sydney, Australia. S33°53'34.20 E151°14'54.50