you can now officially validate your windows 7

link is up and validation servers are running.

http://www.microsoft.com/genuine/validate/

 

Kewl Z, what's the difference between this and MGADiag? Looks like they both accomplish the same thing.

 

Apparently this version actually looks for hacked activation files, and other nefarious ways of activation, whereas the old version just checked ??? (key usage?).

I was not advocating piracy in my other comments; I apologize if it was interpreted that way.

 

this will be coming to everyone via update starting tomm in waves. this is just for those who want to try it now. it is not the same as mgadiag this actuallt checks a lot of things:

What data is collected?
To help you validate your software, Genuine Microsoft Software tools must collect a certain amount of configuration and status information from your computer. The tools do not collect your name, address, e-mail address, or any other information that Microsoft will use to identify you or contact you.

The tools collect information such as:

■Computer make and model
■Version information for the operating system and software
■Region and language settings
■A unique number assigned to your computer by the tools (Globally Unique Identifier or GUID)
■Product Key (hashed) and Product ID
■BIOS name, revision number, and revision date
■Hard drive volume serial number (hashed)
■Whether the installation was successful if one was performed
■The result of the validation check, including error codes and information about any activation exploits and any related malicious or unauthorized software found or disabled, including:
◦The activation exploit’s identifier
◦The activation exploit's current state, such as cleaned or quarantined
◦Original equipment manufacturer identification
◦The activation exploit’s file name and hash of the file, as well as a hash of related software components that may indicate the presence of an activation exploit
■The name and a hash of the contents of the computer's start-up instructions file (commonly called the boot file) to help us discover activation exploits that modify this file.

As standard procedure, your Internet Protocol (IP) address is temporarily logged when your computer connects to a Genuine Microsoft Software website or server.

 

Right. This (what we're trying today) is the exact same thing that will come through WU, right?

Either way, I was not impressed, I'll just leave it at that.

 

Ah, no thanks. I don't need/want msft to be treating me more like a criminal than they already do. And I am required to pay for the privilege.

If msft is going to jam people up like this, why bother with the first-level licensing anyway? Just freely distribute the software (no user keys) and require the user to connect to validation servers 4x per year where some personal information is requested/exchanged.

I predict that there will be a brisk business in the removal of this validation software.

 

this will be automatically included in sp1 fyi. and it will be tagged as a important update so watch your updates if you dont want it but i was informed if you install sp1 you will get this like it or not from a very good source at ms

 

wow lots of issues or what:

http://social.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/genuinewindows7/threads

 

Jeez. No wonder why I don't plan on doing this.

Although I might have to if I want to update to SP1.

It should be optional and make it not included in the SP1 update.

When will MS EVER hop on the "free OS wagon"? Guess I should bring ice skates down to hell and wait.

 

lol i dont think that wait would ever end

 

Yeah...I will be passing on this update.

 

A good question to ask would be:

If this is included in the SP1 update, how many will still pass vs. how many will update?

In my case, I'm not sure. I like staying up-to-date with everything (as long as it's a good update), but I am not interested in using this.

 

I'm not interested either. MS has a right to defend their property, but do it in a way that does not trouble us.

 

never? they're not apple, selling hardware. they sell os licenses, that's all they do (and app licenses and such). if they move that to "free os", well, they lost about ANY of their revenue. it won't happen.

and you should not be picky about it. it's a simple solution they provide you: want os? pay that much. want to know it's a legal one? check online there. and done.

it's nothing about criminalizing the user. it's a check FOR YOU to verify. not for THEM. they just let YOU get informed if something's wrong. they don't care about you specifically doing it wrong. fighting against you would not make economic sense anyways, even if your license is wrong.

all they want is, to find out which keys get used to activate maybe millions of operating systems worldwide (torrented windows f.e.), and fight those. they're free to criminalize ANYONE using such sources, as it is defined to be criminal


i don't see the uproar. they give YOU the tools to find out for YOURSELF if everything's right. i'm happy i have those tools.

and how does it trouble us? if everything's fine, not at all. if it isn't, it's only fair to have to fix those issues f.e. with a simple call. if something (for what ever reason) looks like something illegal, it's always fine to just verify that it's not true, and be done.

just remember, we know some reports of actual legal windows, that failed the tests (mostly back in the early WGA days, where most windows where illegal and it was all chaos). compared to the HOUNDREDS OF MILLION people that use it daily, that's nothing.

 

i know the only person i want adding running tasks to my system is me, this adds 2 running tasks and another every 90 days

 

It seems very easy. I did it in chrome browser.

 

To be absolutely clear, this is OPTIONAL unlike the Vista update and will remain so, regardless of service packs, etc. Source: http://www.winsupersite.com/win7/watu.asp If you want to ensure that this doesn't install, but still want the protection of other Windows updates, simply switch the settings in Action Center to "Check for updates and let me choose when/whether to download and install them."

I'll go ahead and let it download, I'm not in any particular camp when it comes to this.

 

When I logged into the validate page that zFactor listed it forced this download on me. Weird that I had already installed it previously. My suspicion is that if you want to check the validation status of your OS you'll probably need to have this update on your system. Or if MS wants to check if your OS is valid it may require this update to process that check.

 

Indeed, if you want to proactively validate your machine, you'll have to install this tool. That "validation" is basically this tool, just on the web for people to check out if they are curious.

To me I feel this is a double edged sword. By spotting Windows systems that are compromised due to obtaining the OS via illegal means, it makes the entire Windows community a bit safer by letting users know that the aren't safe even if their AV scan's turn up nothing on their pirated machines.

It also allows people who may not know if their machine is running a pirated version (this is rampant with smaller system builders, the metaphorical "mom and pop shop" down the street, smaller OEM's in foreign countries, etc. Times are tough...gotta stay afloat somehow...a big cost is Windows.) to find out and go to MS for next steps-If they can provide proof that they were caught unawares, the customer usually get a remediation kit they can use.

 

I recall there being a Office update similar to this that validates and makes sure your Office is genuwine, did that run similar to this, because I also skipped that update. I hid it.

 

Just to add on to the idea that people who legitimately bought Windows 7 are not affected in any way. A few months back when I was running Vista, a "genuine patch" for Office 2007 Enterprise came up on Windows Update. I installed it since the copy is legitimate and didn't think I'd have any problems. Boy was I wrong. Right after I installed and restarted, I get the message that my office copy is not genuine, great. Eventually, I was able to find instructions on how to manually remove it. Of course, after I did that, it came up again on Windows Update but I hid it. After a few days, the patch was completely gone from the list.

When I installed the same copy of Office on my fresh install of Windows 7, that patch never showed up in the list. My point is that Microsoft clearly made a mistake with identifying my copy as illegitimate and I don't want to go through this process again with future copies of Office or Windows.

 

Lots of skepticism in here.

oh, the huge manatee.

nothing to be scared of, boys and girls. if your install is genuine, step right up. if something goes wrong, a pleasant 5-minute call to MS will yield you a new key to enter. I've done it before.

a phone number is provided. it would have taken about 1/40th the time it took you to hunt down a "patch" to "patch" your legit copy than it would have taken to call in. and you would have had peace of mind.

why do people always resort to trusting shady sources on internets when there are free and easy resolutions? what sense does that make for a legit owner?

hint: it doesn't. unless, of course, you didn't know you could call in.

 

As soon as it ID's your installation as non-genuine, when you have a perfectly legal copy...you'll be singing a different tune.

Way back when I had Vista SP0, I couldn't go more than a week or two before it flagged me as 'non-genuine'. I had a perfectly legal copy too. Went back to XP until Vista SP2 came out, and found whatever the problem was had been fixed.

 

I shouldn't have to call MS for permission to run my software.

Also, there is no such thing as a pleasant 5 minute phone call. Especially to fix someone else's mistakes.

 

Bingo. I paid for my software, now I want to be left alone.

 

I think Microsoft has done enough to bring affordable software to the masses.

I mean seriously, when was the last time you saw a vendor selling the best version of their OS, at launch, to students for 6 months at half price.

 

oh the drama!


I've had rougher conversations with 8 year-olds.

like I said, been there, done that. obviously you haven't or you wouldn't act like it's some grand offense.

Newsflash: Mistakes can happen. Shocking I know, but no system is infallible. They're not going to accuse you of wrongdoing; Just ask for your serial. They'll give you a new one. And if you ask, they'll probably mail you disc media next day if you like.

You'd have a point if they made the process uncomfortable...but guess what? They don't. Not for legit users, anyway..

man, some of you guys pis and moan for the sake of pissing and moaning.

there are lots of fights that make sense to fight. this? not one of them. you guys act like 5 minutes of your time in the HIGHLY *removed by moderator* UNLIKELY EVENT THAT YOUR OS IS ERRANTLY FLAGGED is a big deal. As if all of you guys' post counts here don't tell a different story about the amount of free time you have.

For a process that is so simple and so rare, the amount of resistance and anger is comedic at best. You're fighting a "principle" when the real principle of the matter is that there are entirely too many thieves out there sealing people's hard-earned work. But I bet we won't see any of you starting or posting so fiercely in those threads.

but don't let me stop you guys. you all have a circle-jerk of angry people going on in here. Don't let me distract you from continuing to enjoy it and believing you're right and that you are being "harassed" by flags to your copies of Win 7...that haven't been flagged.

 

...You would have an argument, if the upside to actually running the update and validating successful had some sort of benefit. But it doesn't. There is only a downside that if you do run this and it deems your Windows pirated, then you have to go through a hassle. Not worth it, so that is why I am passing on these updates. Also, the fact that these updates telephone home to MS randomly doesn't make me feel any better about it.

 

There is real no need to be that forward (or rude as some would put it). People are allowed to voice their opinions, right or wrong. Who is anyone to tell people what they can and can't complain about?

You act like you actually work for MS and we are somehow taking money out of your pocket.

None of us are advocating the use of piracy. We all are aware how bad it is, and how much company's suffer. But we paied for the OS out of our own pocket, so we have a right to talk/complain about anything that would involve more work for us, whether it be 5 minutes or 5 hours of work.

 

Indeed, people who don't want to run it simply weighed the advantages and disadvantages of validating.

Advantages:
- None (So you find out what you already knew, that your copy of 7 is legitimate, unless you bought your copy of 7 from a sketchy dude around the corner with a long trench coat)

Disadvantages:
- Small possibility that your legit copy of 7 may be flagged as not genuine, frustration and wasted time to call Microsoft
- People who don't have a legitimate copy (willingly or not willingly) will be annoyed, reformat their copy and not run the validation again, this wasted time and frustration

There are just no advantages or upsides to running this, that's all what people are saying.

 

except the disadvantage 1 is just showing how people can not weight possibilities correctly.

if everyone in switzerland would have win7 legally, and everyone would do it, it would most likely not affect any of us, maybe one.

the problem was more in XP days, where most where gray-zone installation, and popped up thus as non-legal one day.



oh, and btw, your no-advantage point is wrong. i know a lot of people who thought they had a legit installation from some geek, just to get proven otherwise. i know some geeks who still by today install any system for any client with a crack and an invalid license. i even know SHOPS still doing that.


and for THOSE people (which make up 99.9999don'tknowhowmany9% of the microsoft consumers => their target for this update), there IS an advantage: VERIFYING what one BELIEVES to be true.


but sure, geeks like those in here don't care about all and just want to know better. i like to run those things, and show "see, i'm fine". all of you, just crybabies fearing about your illegal retrieved licensees/activations.

imagine all those who start crying "but i bought my license legally and it pops up now2, and we can check back how many of those posted "yeah, got my license for 20$ on ebay, amazing deal". well, wake up, then, dudes

 

I don't see the point in bothering with this.

 

imagine you setting up the system for a client. you can, when handing it over to the client, load up this page and show "see, it's a valid license, activated and working" and hand him the key and disks and all you want to give him.

a simple fail save way to show you're legit, and not some crappy torrenter who tries to make money installing oses he hasn't legally got licenses for.


that's one example.


another could be you buying a nice laptop cheap over ebay, preactivated. you could quickly after receiving check out if something's wrong with the license, to be able to react appropriate then.



those are two examples where this page can be useful.

 

Right...too bad this check deems some LEGIT OS's fake and pirated.

 

What I heard is exact opposite though. Most pirate method can still pass current WAT.

 

funny thing is you are correct. this blocked a number of activation exploits but some still work fine. this was the way with vista and xp etc they will never stop them all. there will always be someone who figures out something new. its a cat and mouse game

 

So I buy a Win 7 license off $20, go home, install it and it works. Then I validate it and tells me that it's not genuine.

Then what? You get pissed off, frustrated because you paid for a cracked copy and the lost time for installing the OS. You can't go back to the seller to get your money back and you're basically screwed. In that situation, wouldn't it be better to just leave the OS alone if it's working?

I know if I bought a copy like that and I still knew it was sketchy, I wouldn't want to risk validating and screwing up the system IF it worked fine for me until now, despite the sketchiness

Ignorance is bliss man.

 

Most 20 dollar keys that you can buy will validate perfectly because they were originally purchased in bulk by companies for their systems. They are not sketchy and there is a huge grey area with respect to them.

Heck you can go to the Acer thread for installing a legal version of the OS from the standard OEM keys for all Acer systems. The only number you have to input is the OEM key for the version you are using. When you later validate, it validates fine even if you have upgraded your version of Win7

I am not, by any means, promoting software piracy and all of my systems are above board but, there are alot of loopholes that make obtaining keys and copies at lower prices legal (or rather not-illegal) with respect to the laws that govern software use.

 

yeah, some, like 10 out of a million or so? or actually, those 10 weren't legit in the first case?

there is no number, only rumours about that. and we know how much the web loves rumours above facts.

it was fact back in xp, at the first WGA releases. since then, there are NO reports on it happening anymore, that are not just rumours of some crackers who hate wga...

in short? get real...

a) you can get your money back, ebay has security for this. and no, if i buy something, i want to know that it's not stolen, or anything. i want it to be from a reputable source.

well, if you like grey-legality, then do what you deserve to do: ignore it. it's for those who want to stay legal and know it. anyone doing grey stuff can just download wgacrack from a torrent, and get real illegal. anything in the middle is just faking yourself into the believe you're not doing something wrong.

 

most of the ebay keys come from technet or the msdn accounts. thats why they are "retail" keys. these are NOT supposed to be resold and if the seller or owner of the technet account gets caught ALL of the keys from that account will be blacklisted including the ones you bought from them. i spoke with a person at ms today who is one of the people now monitoring ebay. they said 90% of the ebay sales come from msdn, technet, scholastic branch. all of those keys will check out as retail with the tools to check them. but they are NOT legit keys. well okay they are till the person gets caught and they all go down. they just caught one person who worked in a school who was pulling keys left and right to sell on ebay. i was told he sold more than 200 keys from 3 accounts he made. this may or may not ever happen and he said sometimes the keys will work for 8-12 months before popping up blacklisted. just be careful buying them.

 

Assuming next version windows will be out 2012, as long as the key is valid for more than 3 months, it is cheaper than windows retail price.

 

I finally just got this update(KB971033) in Windows Update. It was already unchecked. Ha.

 

but for users who are automatic it will install anyway

 

Possibly...but it was unchecked by default, to let the user decide. Welp, anyways that is why I use the setting "Never check for updates."

 

Well my sig laptop ran the update, no issues... It better stay that way. I remember downloading an update for Vista that completely deactivated the genuine advantage crap due to the fact it made thousands of OEM big name machines deactivate.. OEM versions of Windows where the only ones to get the update.

On top of that if people soft or hardmod their loader or BIOS well enough they will never get flagged as not being genuine. It seems to me that MS should give up already on this scheme and do something different... Make it where you must register your computer instead of it just looking at your key or something. All this update is going to do is create hassle for legitimate owners. I bet you MS spent over $1 million on making this update.

 

The update is flagged as important but not check by default.

 

if your updates are set to auto as i have said it will install in anyway though even if not checked because its a important one i have tested this already

 

Yes. This is why NO ONE should EVER allow updates to auto install. I have a major issue with this "phoning home" every 90 days, as do a lot of people.

 

I've had it phone home 3 times since I installed this update. So it looks like it's not going to be every 90 days regardless of what MS says.

 

It's still sitting in my "important" queue and I've just restarted this morning after a crap load of updates. I'll check periodically to see if the same "installs by itself" behavior happens on my machine, I'm curious to see what happens.