3 ms·

How does Lundgren's restore disk work? Most restore disks I've used from OEMs have an OEM Key hardcoded on the disk so the user doesn't have to type in the lic

How does Lundgren's restore disk work? Most restore disks I've used from OEMs have an OEM Key hardcoded on the disk so the user doesn't have to type in the license key on the side of their machine. These Restore Disks are permitted if the OEM is a Licensed Distributor, Lundgren was not a licensed distributor. The ISO files that Microsoft distributes require the user to input a key. His whole argument is questionable: He is trying to reduce e-waste by manufacturing discs, which he says people lose or throw away, and then selling those disks to the very people who lost or threw away their disc originally? He says the discs are used by people who feel comfortable restoring a restore crashed or wiped machines but who don't or can't create the restore media themselves. Microsoft's media creation tool is dead simple, you run it and tell it where to create the media.

Dystopian 9y ago
> Microsoft's media creation tool is dead simple, you run it and tell it where to create the media. As long as you have a computer. Best answer for this is households who only have 1 functioning computer. Usually low-income households. One of my first jobs was working at a computer repair store. Customer would come in looking for a reformat and we'd give them a few options. - We'll restore (pay an hour or so of our time). - Buy a new licence (since we didn't stock restore disks and weren't going to spend time making them). - Buy a new computer - with the advent of dirt cheap computers a lot of the time this was a viable solution. These disks definitely fill a hole of having something you could give to clients and they could do the DIY route.
- cptskippy 9y ago
  That's all true And he was not licensed to distribute Microsoft Software.
  - e12e 9y ago
    Interesting that this makes it illegal to download install media for a friend. So if someone locks themselves out of bitlocker, or the drive fails - they'd need to boot into a free operating system (say a live Linux distros that they could legally get from a friend) - and then download and make an install stick for Windows. Because someone else lending them a ready-made windows USB key (from the free download ms offers) would be illegal distribution of copyrighted material. So much for right to help with repair/fair use etc.
monocasa 9y ago
Since around Vista, I thought that OEM keys were embedded in the BIOS, so they can use the same disk images.

Dystopian 9y ago

> Microsoft's media creation tool is dead simple, you run it and tell it where to create the media. As long as you have a computer. Best answer for this is households who only have 1 functioning computer. Usually low-income households. One of my first jobs was working at a computer repair store. Customer would come in looking for a reformat and we'd give them a few options. - We'll restore (pay an hour or so of our time). - Buy a new licence (since we didn't stock restore disks and weren't going to spend time making them). - Buy a new computer - with the advent of dirt cheap computers a lot of the time this was a viable solution. These disks definitely fill a hole of having something you could give to clients and they could do the DIY route.

cptskippy 9y ago
That's all true And he was not licensed to distribute Microsoft Software.
- e12e 9y ago
  Interesting that this makes it illegal to download install media for a friend. So if someone locks themselves out of bitlocker, or the drive fails - they'd need to boot into a free operating system (say a live Linux distros that they could legally get from a friend) - and then download and make an install stick for Windows. Because someone else lending them a ready-made windows USB key (from the free download ms offers) would be illegal distribution of copyrighted material. So much for right to help with repair/fair use etc.

monocasa 9y ago

Since around Vista, I thought that OEM keys were embedded in the BIOS, so they can use the same disk images.