Michael

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http://www.tabletpcblogs.com/blogs/fyiguy/archive/2005/08.aspx

Hope this helps some people that do run into problems with their Tablets.

:)

I think a definition of terms is in order.
Recovery CD: OEM bundled package-o-crap with their RealPlayers, OEM Software, and knick-knacks that most people uninstall the first time they boot up. It may or may not include the OS and most cases does not.
OEM CD: Full install operating system tied to the OEM. This is a specific version of Windows that reads the OEM stuff so that you never have to input your license key if it’s on the licensed hardware. OEM software will not activate on non-licensed hardware. For proof, try installing an OEM version of Windows XP inside Virtual PC.

Recovery CDs are almost useless but in some cases they have things like utilities to rebuild that FAT partition that keeps lame laptop related stuff on it, or other justifications for whatever the hell they want. The real problem is the OEM CD which is NOT available by retail, ANYWHERE.

You have 2 options:
1) OEM includes said CD
2) Download said CD off distribution channels. It’s your hardware and your key, the software just happens to come from someone else. So technically you own a legal product, you just downloaded the media in not-so-nice methods. No harm no foul if they’re going to be stingy punks but then who ends up biting it in this scenario? Microsoft, not the OEMs.

So as a result, Microsoft does need to do something about them. This is nothing like those “bad days” at all. OEMs are just trying to short change customers who have more than paid for a $1 CD copy. They’re taking advantage of those “bad days” from Microsoft to provide “bad days” from (insert lame OEM here).

The guilty parties here are the OEM’s not Microsoft. If Microsoft mandated OS media be supplied it would be too much like the “bad days” when Microsoft was an illegal monopoly that harmed customers by running around micro-managing OEM’s through those OEM contracts.

Any OEM that cares so little for their customers deserves to lose those customers to an OEM such as Motion Computing.

Your news is very good in that it makes the request of Microsoft I wrote about easier to affect if there is no restriction on their part about the OS distribution. They would just have to mandate it be included with every Tablet PC as part of the OEM license. Thanks for sharing that information.

Why am I questioning it? Because when I bought my HP TC1100 Tablet PC in January this year, HP shipped a full Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005 DVD with it – not a recovery disk, but a full installation DVD.

So I’m merely an end-user, but I have in front of me a complete Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005 DVD.

My TC1100 actually died in the first week of use and I had to borrow an external DVD-ROM drive, reformat and reinstall from scratch. This is when I discovered that the DVD was actually a full install disk and not merely a recovery disk. An additional CD was in the package with all the necessary drivers and utilities from HP, which I had to separately install after Windows installation was completed.

So while I agree wholeheartedly with what you’re saying (that full installation media needs to be included with each new Tablet PC), maybe the tide has already turned and some OEMs are starting to do this already?

Stephen Mok
Sydney, Australia

http://www.petitiononline.com/7bbjmgr9/petition.html