license questions

[Lionskeep]

Dear Community Members,

I'm a german IT engineer, who's running his own business.

If i would buy a VMware Workstation license, would it be legally possible to set up the customers former OS's in VMware and let the finished virtual machine (together with the license free player) go to work on the customers new OS ?

Explanation 1 : A customer runs a very specific software on f.e. W2K on an old PC. Then he buys a new computer with Vista/Windows 7 etc. , migration won't work without lots of efforts. Can i just pack the old OS ( all legal licences ) in a VM and serve it with Vista without getting lots of problems ?

Explanation 2 : A customer has an old PC with an old OS. He buys a new PC with a new OS, and want to keep the old OS as use for a sandbox or to migrate parts when needed. Same question.

P.S.: Is it possible to order the retail package with the german handbook for 209 USD from outside the US ? Is the handbook worth the plus on effort ?

Best regards,

Bernhard Stegen

[Kotofeich]

AFAIK it would be legal from the Microsoft point of view, since the customer has licenses for all the software that would be contained in a vmware.

It would also be legal from the VMWare point of view provided the customer accepts the terms and conditions of use of the VM Player.

(The only reason I know is that we sometimes demo our products to a customer as a self contained (there are often dozens of components we need) vmware that customers can run in vmplayer. We ask that customers install the vm player themselves so that they accept the terms and conditions of it.

Frankly, to get the best answer you should call VMWare sales...

If you are in Germany - http://www.vmware.com/company/office_germany.html

[Lionskeep]

Thanks