Microsoft's vaunted Product Activation protection technology may not have been fully implemented in Office XP after all. Product keys claimed to be "universal" have been circulating on the Web for some weeks now, and a WinXP beta tester's newsgroup posting forwarded to The Register suggests that use of one of these keys circumvents the activation process.
It is not at the moment possible to verify this completely. Warez copies of code claimed to Office XP "final" reportedly run without requiring activation if one of the keys is used, but those keys can't be said to be definitely universal until such time as they can be tested on production copies of Office XP sold at retail. |
The report from the beta newsgroup does however provide some level of verification of the matter. The tester says he installed the RC1/CPP (Release Candidate 1/Corporate Preview Program) version of OXP Word and Excel using one of the "universal" keys. Clicking on activate product after this produced the message: "this product has already been activated."
And more Microsoft news, NaTaN[XP] used our newssubmit to report that
Beta 2 Of Windows XP (Windows Codenamed Whistler) has been Released ! Build is 2462. And no, we don't know where to download it ! (And please don't post links )
Updated:
kag used our newssubmit to tell us:
In the universal key for office article, you say the build for winxp beta 2 is 2462, but it's in fact 2462a |
Source: TheRegister
