If you're on the fence about the impending release of Windows Vista, I recommend trying before you buy. Every Vista DVD includes the ability to install any edition of Vista without a product key. When you install without a product key, you get an automatic 30 day evaluation period.* This probably isn't news to anyone.
I love the set-up for evaluation but the problem with the enterprise edition is that it has already been hacked so anyone cn have free Vista forever.
Where can we get the download of the trial?
Where can we get the download of the trial?
The only trial available right now is for RC1. I presume MS will have a download site for the Vista trial at some point.
In the meantime, I recommend searching your favorite bittorrent tracker sites for the Vista final DVD. I don’t see anything wrong with this, since you’ll be doing a legitimate trial exactly as Microsoft intended (and is supported within Vista itself).
Decide either to pony up the cash for ultimate or just spend 3 hours reinstalling the thing??
I don’t know if reinstalling will reset the counters. Somehow I doubt it, that seems like an obvious hole. And it wouldn’t take 3 hours to reinstall Vista in any case… less than an hour, tops.
The Family Pack would be a sure thing for me, but Vista Home Premium doesn’t support Remote Desktop, and I can’t think of any of the computers I have at home that I wouldn’t want to Remote Desktop into from my laptop.
One question about the OEM license though,
If I install it one pc, uninstall it later and install it on an other pc, will it continue to work ?
So, can you use an OEM-license (not simultaneously) on different PC’s ?
NO, that is the whole point with OEM, it’s tied to one machine (actually motherboard).
However, I know people that switched motherboard and called MS when activating and told them the motherboard broke and they were allowed to activate, so I guess it depends on how devious you are 
Well, that depends on another important factor: Updates. Does the “trial” allow for full updates through the Windows Update feature, that’ll have security fixes, enhancements, etc? Because with any Windows version you can find a way to get it “Free forever”, but at what expense? Mostly they don’t have access to the updates. You could give me a free Windows XP SP1, but I wouldn’t use it. likewise you could probably use a “trial” Vista, but would it really be worth it after a certain point in time?
I finally found a link to the official word on the Windows Family Discount.
http://windowsvistablog.com/blogs/windowsvista/archive/2007/01/17/multiple-announcments-today.aspx
Because with any Windows version you can find a way to get it “Free forever”, but at what expense?
First of all, even pirated XP clients get critical updates. And obviously Vista, during the eval period, gets all available updates.
Unlike Windows XP, WGA (now WSPP) is built into Vista from day one. And the consequences of remaining “non-geniune” are far more dire than in XP. Vista shifts to “you can’t do anything but open a web browser to buy a valid license” mode if it remains unvalidated long enough.
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=148
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Reduced functionality mode in Windows Vista will allow the user to use the browser after the reduced functionality mode has begun. Reduced functionality mode can occur as a result of failed product activation or of that copy being identified as counterfeit or non-genuine.
Nice to see some of the final prices. Now I just have to decide if that price + the $689 to upgrade hardware/software that will not work under Vista is worth the few worthwhile items that I don’t already have.
Why are all the discounts always only for the US and Canada ? I have never seen a single discount from MS in Sweden where I live. Sure, if you buy a computer with XP a month before release you get Vista for free but that’s it.
We want these discounts as well 
"Why are all the discounts always only for the US and Canada ? I have never seen a single discount from MS in Sweden where I live. Sure, if you buy a computer with XP a month before release you get Vista for free but that’s it.
We want these discounts as well :("
Competition issues. Many nations put restrictions on the promotions that foreign companies can do to help local businesses stay competitive.
There are rules as to how much “value” you can give away free with your product in many places, as well as rules about how much money could be won in a sweepstakes.
There are no such laws here, maybe in North Korea.
This is a matter of a US company still only catering to their home market and letting the rest of the world pay for it.
As far as I understand it you can’t even buy a Vista license online from outside the US, one of the most talked about features with the Vista launch.
Havent heard Microsoft say this is officially supported, maybe someone just plain forgot to remove it in RTM.
120 days is a pretty long time, computer enthusiasts rarerly have a system installed for that long so if you can handle the bother of reinstalling it after four months you could run Vista for free forever.
If this was really intended I wonder what Microsoft plans to offer to those that actually buy it, like offering extras for those that activate it with a proper key.
So, if you trial Vista and decide not to buy it, does Vista politely roll your system back to its previous state?
I doubt it - I’m sure Microsoft’s thinking in this regard is: Who would ever want to rollback to a pre-Vista system? Not gonna happen, so we don’t need to code for it.
I do find this quite extraordinary, perhaps a new attack vector? However, it’s certainly useful for me as I often will have systems up for a few months and then rebuild. Saves me the trouble of putting in an MSDN or other key.
As a gamer XP and Vista is the way to go for me at my home computer. However until performance gets better in games I’ll wait. If Microsoft or NVIDIA is to blame for these poor results I don’t know.
http://techgage.com/article/windows_vista_gaming_performance_reports
It’s all video drivers. They’re still immature, which is very annoying. I expect both companies to release new drivers on launch day, though.
The only other thing that might affect background performance is that indexing, Windows Defender, and superfetch are now on by default in the background. These services are “in the box” for Vista.
If Microsoft or NVIDIA is to blame for these poor results I don’t know.
regarding the game performance, It’s likely a driver issue, which would put the blame on nvidia, and not microsoft. As the drivers get better, the performance will improve.
Additionally, in the report which you cited, an nvidia graphics card was tested. Other tests tend to show that ati’s drivers work better:
http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/17/gameplay-only-gets-worse-with-vista/
(both companies drivers have a lot of room for improvement).