Why wont Asus provide me with Vista 64?

At first thought your probably saying to your self, “Why WOULD they?”

Just hear me out.

I am totally and completely pissed off at this.

My buddy buys a Gateway. On the OS CD comes two versions of Vista. 32 and 64. Both of witch use the same CD key.

I ordered a Dell 14?? About 9 months ago. Last month I jump on Dells live chat and said, “Hey. My laptop come with Vista 32, could you send me Vista 64?” The tec reads me the riot act on how they wont support the software, only the hardware, asks if I agree, I saw yes. Three days later Vista 64 is at my door free of charge. Up to and including free shipping.

My dad, after purchasing retail Vista 32, goes on Microsoft’s web site, pays $10 for shipping and handling and Microsoft sends him a “free” upgrade to 64.

I jump on Asus’s live chat to try my luck, “Hey, can I get Vista 64?” They say, “No.”

And its game on.

I must have gone through 7 to 10 live chatters. Some of them just disconnect as soon as I say, “Hi, I would like to get the 64 bit version of Windows Vista please.” The furthest I got was, “Did it come with 64?” My answer was, “No.” A second later the chat session ends. (maybe I should have said yes).

So then I figure I will get a live person on the phone.

I explain to him that you can not purchase 64. That it is a free upgrade through Microsoft upon purchasing the retail version of Vista 32. I explain to him Gateway ships with an “all-in-one” CD and that Dell just mailed me 64 for free. The tec retorts by telling me he doesn’t know how they are getting away with it as they are only allowed one license per computer. Furthermore he tells me Vista 32 and Vista 64 share separate CD keys.

HUH?! The bull sh!t flag goes up! “Wait sir,” I say. Microsoft offers free upgrades for those who purchased the retail version of 32. The tec replies, “I have heard of some situations were Microsoft voids your old 32 CD key and issues you a new one 64 one.”

My heart drops. I now realize Asus tecs have no clue what goes on out side their company.

After about 20 minutes of this, I reaffirm with the tec, “Sir, do you realize you can not buy a retail version of Vista Home Premium 64? That you have to purchase the retail 32 bit version and request through Microsoft the 64?

The tec says, “Yes.” (slightly contradictory to other statements but whatever…)

I clarified by asking, “So what your saying is, I have to go buy a retail version of Windows Vista Home 32, witch my laptop comes with, in order to get the 64 bit version from Microsoft?

The tec says, “Yes.”

I respond with, “That doesn’t make any since. Do you hear what your saying?”

The line goes dead.

Thoughts? Concerns? B!tches? Gripes? Complaints?

This just seems wrong to me.

Really though... any explanation in the inconsistancys between companies. This isnt a little thing... Two give it out for free. The other refuses any sort of option what so ever...

I dont get it..

 

Why do you need Vista 64 from Asus? You already have disks from Dell and Microsoft. Just use one of those disks with the key from your Asus. All those disks will be the same.

 

They seriously hung up on you/disconnected the live chat sessions without saying anything? That's pretty rude...

 

Actually it might not work, I remember working on an older G50v and I was installing Vista 64 on it. I had a retail copy of Vista 64 home premium and the G50 came with Vista 64 bit. So when i tried to install, the key that came with the laptop was always being rejected, so I just ended up using the CD's that came with the laptop.

 

Read this link. It should probably explain to you why your key didn't work and how to do a clean install.

 

Good point, but NOT the point... lol

 

I'd be interested in figuring out how to get a 64-bit version of Vista Home as well. The N80vn ships with 4gb of ram but only the 32-bit version of Vista Home Premium. Is it possible to just get an upgrade via MS themselves?

 

You can but it won't work with an OEM Activated OS. MS tells you to contact your system manufacturer and that it's out of their hands.

I love Asus' machines, but their customer service idiots in India or Asia are retarded and rude as hell. Personally, I've never had to deal with a broken Asus in my life and I've gone through 6 of them. ...knocking...

 

The keys are not the same. Asus has a block of keys they buy. You can not use any 64 bit disk with the key on your laptop. It will not work. Already tried

 

The one actual rep I spoke to on the phone, to the best I could tell, was clearly American. The live chat dudes on the other had.... well that I'm not sure about. But regardless, even though the actual person was much more... for lack of a better word... "helpful" he still pretty much told me the same thing the live chat dudes said.

I dont understand how MS says see your system builder, but when you go to your system builder they see see MS.

Asus is wrong. They have to be... But why.. and how do we get this corrected?

 

Unlike retail licenses which give you rights to both 32bit and 64bit with the same key/license

OEM versions are good for one or the other. Asus probably bought a ton of 32bit ones they need to use and thus thats what came with the system. If they gave 2 keys to you that would be thousands of people demanding the same and they would be paying double for the OS for each computer.

I agree that it was a dumb move to ship computers that come with 4gb of ram with a 32bit OS, I spoke out about that before the units were even in stock & shipping. But I knew and anybody had the ability to know before buying that 32bit was what came with the system, and thus there is no means to complain.

Its also more of a feel good thing to have all 4gb of ram in windows, using 32bit and getting about 3.2gb performs just the same.

If you insist on the change though ou can get a retail upgrade disk and upgrade to 64bit since that will give you a new key & license.

 

But see... thats the thing.... to the best of my knowledge, that is not correct. The CD Keys, based off what I have seen and heard from Dell and Gateway, they ARE the same. I think that is the huge misunderstanding.

My buddy with the Gateway dual OS DVD says the CD Keys are the same. Pluss why would Dell give me both then? Because that is true, if it were two licenses then it would effectively double the cost. Gateway wouldn't be giving you two OSes nor would Dell be sending out 64 bit free of charge. That would be the same affective thing as me callign and saying, "Hey, my computer came with XP but I want Vista." And they say, "OK sure, here it is for nothing."

I could see Dell giving out 64 on request... MAYBE... but Gateway shipping both on one CD? You are completely correct, that would double their costs.... It has to be one serial.

 

Well lets put it this way, legally they are not the same

Sounds like Gateway is not using OEM keys but retail keys. Many companies offer to sell you retail as part of your package. Asus however includes OEM as a part of the package, and not a stand alone disk its embeded in the recovery disk so it has the OEM key inside that disk.

OEM gives rights for one version for one computer only, even if they do work (and I have heard it does and doesn't) it would be illegal to use a 32bit OEM key for a 64bit version of Windows.

If you think it will work, just use anybodies 64bit disk with your key and see what happens.

All disks for Vista are the same they are a 64bit disk or a 32bit disk and the key is what determines what version it installs.

A recover disk is obviously different its not a Vista disk and you may have to extract your key from a install to know what it is, or call MS and give the code on the bottom of the notebook and get a key.

 

Read the tread I posted the link to earlier.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=120228

It explains that the Key on the bottom of the laptop is not the key that is actually used in your installation. Use Magic Jelly Bean to compare them. If you use the the instructions in the above thread, you should be able to install 64bit Vista.

I intend to try it with the Home Basic installation on my Acer 5315 this weekend.

 

I know its not the same key, thats why said you have to call MS with it....

and again

You say your disk is lost/broken and read that off to them and they can give you a new key....

Its proof that you own rights to a legal version of the OS and they will give you a key without hassle if you have to use it. I know people that have done it before.

 

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Do they have any way of knowing if it is for 32 or 64?

 

Honestly, I wouldn't bother. Fine for me on my desktop where I work with VMs a lot and so have a ton of RAM, but on a laptop with a 4GB memory limit it's not nearly as worthwhile - especially when you consider that a cleanly booted Vista x64 system uses about 1.7GB of RAM before you have much going, vs less than a GB under 32bit. With a system bottlenecked at 4GB any RAM you gain from being x64 is immediately spent on overhead, leaving you with about the same amount of actual *usable* RAM.