I need some warranty information

[Styyl]

My MacBook hard drive recently died on me. Fortunately, I had managed to back up most of my music, photos, and other important files onto my new iMac before the drive broke, so I have nothing to worry about in that respect. Furthermore, I only got the computer in August, so it's still under its original warranty, let alone the additional AppleCare that I got along with it. I can rest assured that I'll be able to exchange the drive without any problems.

However, I had installed Office 2004 on the machine from a three-license package, of which only two registration codes remain. I need to know if Apple will recover my license or at least give me another registration code if they replace my drive. My father plans to purchase a Mac Mini for work some time in the near future, and that will use up my final registration code, so I want to know if I will have to purchase another license to reinstall Office on the computer.

 

[kornyboy]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/4A102 Safari/419.3)

I don't think that you will. I had an old iMac, a Powerbook, and a Powermac G5 all running Office 2004, the one with three licenses. When the PowerBook's hard drive died I bought a MacBook, since the PowerBook was old and out of warranty including Apple Care, and I was able to install Office 2004 using the same license as the PowerBook on the MacBook. I hope this helps.

 

[merl1n]

My MacBook hard drive recently died on me. Fortunately, I had managed to back up most of my music, photos, and other important files onto my new iMac before the drive broke, so I have nothing to worry about in that respect. Furthermore, I only got the computer in August, so it's still under its original warranty, let alone the additional AppleCare that I got along with it. I can rest assured that I'll be able to exchange the drive without any problems.

However, I had installed Office 2004 on the machine from a three-license package, of which only two registration codes remain. I need to know if Apple will recover my license or at least give me another registration code if they replace my drive. My father plans to purchase a Mac Mini for work some time in the near future, and that will use up my final registration code, so I want to know if I will have to purchase another license to reinstall Office on the computer.

No, apple will only replace the disk and load a fresh OS on it. You should be able to reinstall Office and use the original license code.

 

[Styyl]

No, apple will only replace the disk and load a fresh OS on it. You should be able to reinstall Office and use the original license code.

Thanks. That's good to know. What if it's a new machine entirely, though?

 

[merl1n]

Thanks. That's good to know. What if it's a new machine entirely, though?

That won't make a difference. As long as you use the same license code as before Office doesn't care.

 

[Styyl]

That won't make a difference. As long as you use the same license code as before Office doesn't care.

What's the point in giving us multiple registration codes at all, then? Could I have just used the same code for my iMac as well without any problems?

 

[merl1n]

What's the point in giving us multiple registration codes at all, then? Could I have just used the same code for my iMac as well without any problems?

No, you couldn't.

MS is pretty shifty. What they did was use software ports and check other computers on your network. If you launch any Office App and it detects the same license on another computer on your network, it will bring up a dialog stating that you can't run it because another computer is using the license and then abruptly quit the apps on both computers.

When I was running Office 2004 in Tiger (I now use 2008 in Leopard), I had to write a program to block the ports it was using in order to run 2004 on both of my computers.

 

[Styyl]

No, you couldn't.

MS is pretty shifty. What they did was use software ports and check other computers on your network. If you launch any Office App and it detects the same license on another computer on your network, it will bring up a dialog stating that you can't run it because another computer is using the license and then abruptly quit the apps on both computers.

When I was running Office 2004 in Tiger (I now use 2008 in Leopard), I had to write a program to block the ports it was using in order to run 2004 on both of my computers.

I see. Thanks for answering all of my questions.

 

[jeremy.king]

When I was running Office 2004 in Tiger (I now use 2008 in Leopard), I had to write a program to block the ports it was using in order to run 2004 on both of my computers.

Or just buy another copy - I know it's the evil enterprise that is so hip to hate, but still... Or better yet, use OO or Neo...