HCHTech
Well-Known Member
- Reaction score
- 3,848
- Location
- Pittsburgh, PA - USA
So I was helping another tech in my area with a large project today, 34 new workstations, data transfer, etc.
Each workstation needed Office & Publisher. He had purchased OEM Home & Business and OEM Standalone Publisher licenses. They all came in the little boxes with the product keys on cards.
The "plan" was to register them all with a single Microsoft account created for this purpose using one of the employee's email addresses. I know I remember a thread in the last couple of years about this being a problem, but a quick search didn't find it. I spent a couple of minutes on Google, also with indeterminate results.
So we forged ahead in the name of science.
Apparently the limit is either 11 or 12, or it was in our case, at least. After that, the installs wouldn't activate unless you used the telephone method. It took you directly to the account page and asked you to pick which license was the one you were activating - which a) didn't make sense since only of the licenses that were ALREADY ACTIVATED showed on the account page, and b) you can't tell which license was which without clicking on the 'Install from Disk' and then 'I have a disk' links, followed by the 'show product key' button. What a headache.
On the last one I tried, after clicking on the click-to-run icon and entering the product key for Office, it installed Publisher. I know I put in the right key because I had the card in my hand and hadn't even opened the Publisher box yet. I decided that was a good place to stop, LOL.
We were out of time for the day in any event, so I guess they will create another Microsoft account to start the day tomorrow.
But seriously, what a cluster****. I am not buying the idea of creating an MS account for every employee, how the heck do you manage that as a business? What exactly is the plan here, Microsoft?
I don't normally deal with installations this large so I guess I'll ask the naive question here: what is the *correct* way to register office for groups of >11 or 12? Separate individual MS accounts? Really? I get it that for 100 you would use volume licensing, but there is a vast gulf between that and the onesie-twosies in the SOHO crowd that are ok with individual licensing.
Each workstation needed Office & Publisher. He had purchased OEM Home & Business and OEM Standalone Publisher licenses. They all came in the little boxes with the product keys on cards.
The "plan" was to register them all with a single Microsoft account created for this purpose using one of the employee's email addresses. I know I remember a thread in the last couple of years about this being a problem, but a quick search didn't find it. I spent a couple of minutes on Google, also with indeterminate results.
So we forged ahead in the name of science.
Apparently the limit is either 11 or 12, or it was in our case, at least. After that, the installs wouldn't activate unless you used the telephone method. It took you directly to the account page and asked you to pick which license was the one you were activating - which a) didn't make sense since only of the licenses that were ALREADY ACTIVATED showed on the account page, and b) you can't tell which license was which without clicking on the 'Install from Disk' and then 'I have a disk' links, followed by the 'show product key' button. What a headache.
On the last one I tried, after clicking on the click-to-run icon and entering the product key for Office, it installed Publisher. I know I put in the right key because I had the card in my hand and hadn't even opened the Publisher box yet. I decided that was a good place to stop, LOL.
We were out of time for the day in any event, so I guess they will create another Microsoft account to start the day tomorrow.
But seriously, what a cluster****. I am not buying the idea of creating an MS account for every employee, how the heck do you manage that as a business? What exactly is the plan here, Microsoft?
I don't normally deal with installations this large so I guess I'll ask the naive question here: what is the *correct* way to register office for groups of >11 or 12? Separate individual MS accounts? Really? I get it that for 100 you would use volume licensing, but there is a vast gulf between that and the onesie-twosies in the SOHO crowd that are ok with individual licensing.
