[boriyako]

Greetings all

I bought a copy of MS Office 2003 Pro in London about 3 years ago. It cost me £79 at the time (I had no idea of what prices were at that time - I was a relative novice and had just bought my laptop from Dell)

When I queried why I did not get a package and disk, I was told that the shop had a licence to load to multiple pcs from only one disk and I was given a flash drive with the software and product key on it. Happy as Larry off I went.

I have happily used it since that time - regularly updating via Microsoft's site - with no problem.

About 10 days ago when I fired up MSWord, I got a message stating that my copy is illegal!!

I am now sitting in Zimbabwe so going back to shop is no option. Foolishly, I never kept the receipt and subsequently lost the flash drive (although I made a copy of the software and product key)

I sent an email to Microsoft US and they replied that I should contact Microsoft in the UK

Do you think there is any point in doing so, or have I been taken and now have to find/buy a new copy?

Aaaaaaaaaaaargh!!!!!



Thanks & cheers

[Advertisements]

Yes, I would go ahead and at least try. Microsoft has, at times, straightened out these problems for people. You may be required to pay a small fee for a Product Key only.

The best alternative to Micro$oft's Office is to use the FREE OpenOffice. Is will do everything that Office does. Has a Powerpoint, Excel, etc., but not by those names. It is open sourced.

[AstraNut]

Yes, I would go ahead and at least try. Microsoft has, at times, straightened out these problems for people. You may be required to pay a small fee for a Product Key only.

The best alternative to Micro$oft's Office is to use the FREE OpenOffice. Is will do everything that Office does. Has a Powerpoint, Excel, etc., but not by those names. It is open sourced.

[mikeloeven]

your copy is not illegal. if you have been updating it for that long and this hasent already happened, you do have a legitimate key. more than likley someone got a keygen that randomly spit out your legitimate key through sheer luck or the store exeeded their volume liscense agreement either way the key probibly got blacklisted through no fault of your own. if you have the recipt microsoft will probibly give you a new one. if they dont and try to make you pay keep in mind that genuine is a microsoft word plugin and can be turned off in the registry. of course you probibly wont be able to update office again and if it lets you it will reactivate the plugin.

go to HKLM/software/microsoft/office. there will be a folder for each office program you have installed for example there is a folder called word and one called powerpoint etc. one at a time open each of these folders, go to addins subdirectory than open the ogaaddin.connect key and set load behavior varible to 0. this will tell office not to load the genuine plugin when it starts up

personally if your copy of office is legitimate as i suspect oga will never turn on again even if you update it. (i had a legitimate office go illegal on me. the disk had the microsoft genuine hologram on it and the key had all the right markings. i turned the plugin off once and it never came back. it even let me keep updating)


microsoft really doesent know what their doing with genuine advantage it never catches the realy good pirated copies and has a tendancy to randomly nail innocent people. it is a poorly designed system that is only good for making them more money. no sooner had windows 7 came out than there was a hack to make pirated coppies legitimate. the only victems of genuine are the people who pay for the software because the real pirates already know how to disable it before the freaking software is even released. it's a really sad story indeed

Edited by mikeloeven, 29 June 2010 - 03:41 PM.

[boriyako]

Many many thanks to both of you folks.

Much appreciated

Will follow the advice given

Cheers
Miles

[AstraNut]

You're welcome. I don't think M$ will give you much trouble over a 2003 Product once you give the Product Code you received. Nobody keeps receipts that long anyway unless they are tax records.

[dsenette]

your copy is not illegal. if you have been updating it for that long and this hasent already happened, you do have a legitimate key

your advice is quite incorrect mike. the shop in london described their install disk as one that can be used to install on multiple computers. which means they're using a VLK version of office. which is NOT legally transferable outside of the licensee's control (i.e. a PC shop selling a VLK as if it's a retail or OEM license). the key itself MAY be legitimate but it's usage is not.

you need to call microsoft and get this straightened out. if you explain the full situation they will take care of it pretty quickly and probably at no cost.



as to WGA "nailing" legitimate people. that's a simple fix, call MS or send them an email and explain the issue, they'll take care of it.

[mikeloeven]

your copy is not illegal. if you have been updating it for that long and this hasent already happened, you do have a legitimate key

your advice is quite incorrect mike. the shop in london described their install disk as one that can be used to install on multiple computers. which means they're using a VLK version of office. which is NOT legally transferable outside of the licensee's control (i.e. a PC shop selling a VLK as if it's a retail or OEM license). the key itself MAY be legitimate but it's usage is not.

you need to call microsoft and get this straightened out. if you explain the full situation they will take care of it pretty quickly and probably at no cost.



as to WGA "nailing" legitimate people. that's a simple fix, call MS or send them an email and explain the issue, they'll take care of it.

lol microsoft charges you money just to speak to a computer system and the cost of actuially getting to a real person is probibly more than a new version of office 2007... unless you know a direct number your not telling anyone

[dsenette]

lol microsoft charges you money just to speak to a computer system and the cost of actuially getting to a real person is probibly more than a new version of office 2007... unless you know a direct number your not telling anyone

incorrect. microsoft does NOT charge you to talk to their computer or a real person for licensing issues or issues with windows update (both of which relate to the OP's issue). for support with errors and configuration they will charge (a lot). for licensing etc.. they won't. you may have to enter a credit card number at the beginning of the call, but once it's determined that you're calling for a "no charge" issue, they won't charge your card for any portion of the call

Edited by dsenette, 30 June 2010 - 08:28 AM.

[mikeloeven]

lol microsoft charges you money just to speak to a computer system and the cost of actuially getting to a real person is probibly more than a new version of office 2007... unless you know a direct number your not telling anyone

incorrect. microsoft does NOT charge you to talk to their computer or a real person for licensing issues or issues with windows update (both of which relate to the OP's issue). for support with errors and configuration they will charge (a lot). for licensing etc.. they won't. you may have to enter a credit card number at the beginning of the call, but once it's determined that you're calling for a "no charge" issue, they won't charge your card for any portion of the call

thats my issue i dont want to give microsoft my credit card ever XD

[dsenette]

well don't blame someone else for your paranoia and mistrust

[mikeloeven]

well don't blame someone else for your paranoia and mistrust

but ..... Microsoft's such a big and squishy target for random rage

Edited by mikeloeven, 01 July 2010 - 09:09 AM.