Medialess

May 23, 2008 2:01 AM

Can I actually buy an Office 2007 DISC? As in, the actual media? I have really struggled with this, since reinstalling Office 2007 on a reformatted 'Office-ready PC' is impossible: Reformatting obviously wipes out your Office install and the the trial version (which is the only thing available to download) is incompatible with (some of?) Microsoft's own license keys.

The Indian support staff refused to help me with this issue (maybe because it's a known issue?). They actually sent to me a non-existent knowledge base article!

posted by chuckdarwin to computers & internet (8 comments total)

Is this the number you tried to call?
posted by knave at 2:12 AM on May 23, 2008

Retail box versions contain CD media. Volume licensing presumes you're going to be doing server based installs, but you can still have master copies of media shipped in, if you like. Most people administering business networks build a disk image, or images, for common platforms, with their volume license products already in it, and create an answer file or files, as necessary, for automated installs. Wipe, image, initialize OS and productivity suite, via answer file, in about two hours, on most modern machines.

Or do I not understand your question?
posted by paulsc at 2:28 AM on May 23, 2008

Yes. Your nearest PC World will stock it.
posted by nthdegx at 3:24 AM on May 23, 2008

Thanks, paulsc, the company I work for is unfortunately too small, too spread out, and disjointed (as in, on several different domains and workgroups) to make a server-based image install feasible.

A brand-new "Office-Ready" PC which we had already bought a license for was reformatted, and Microsoft directed me to download the trial version of 2007. The trial version is incompatible with their license key.

I really, really needed the media, and was caught short.
posted by chuckdarwin at 3:36 AM on May 23, 2008

It sounds like chuckdarwin has a key already and just needs the media to reinstall from.
You can get just the replacement media (if that's all you need) from Microsoft, but, it's possible that your office key is an OEM key and might not work with the retail/replacement media anyway.
posted by yeoz at 6:05 AM on May 23, 2008

Assuming you have a volume license, you may also have a technet subscription as well. Office will be available for download (as an ISO) from that.

Failing that, you could contact your vendor and have the appropriate media shipped to you for some cost. The specifics of how to accomplish that would depend on your workplace.

The reason MS makes the trial version incompatible with the volume license key is to prevent casual piracy - the kind where someone snags the license key from work and tries to install it at home without the media.

The trial edition will allow you to use Office until you can find the appropriate media to install from (60 days I think). Updating the product key will then require a reinstallation of Office, but no loss of functionality should ensue.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 6:07 AM on May 23, 2008

This wouldn't be the most 'ethical' way of going about this but you could figure out which version of Office 2007 your license is for, download that version from a torrent site and then use your key to install it.
posted by Diskeater at 6:07 AM on May 23, 2008

Sounds like he's got an OEM key. These "Office-ready" machines, I presume they came with some way to make Recovery media when you first start them up? Can you do that on one of the others and use that to put the system back to it's original state?
posted by JaredSeth at 7:44 AM on May 23, 2008