Is this a fake disc, or does Windows 7 come in different 'versions'?

In My Humble Opinion
1

A friend of mine bought windows 7 from ebay. The seller had good feedback but shortly after he bought it the seller’s account was closed with some mysterious advisos from ebay.

He had reason to believe his copy was fake, but a very ‘good’ one. I offered to get my own genuine copy (bought from Amazon) to compare. I also offered to take photos for evidence…

There are clearly differences in style and quality. But what surprises me is the apparent sophistication of the fake.

Is it common for counterfeiters to have access to the kind of technology to make this possible?

Or could this actually be an earlier or cheaper-produced genuine? (cheaply produced for the purpose of companies who buy in bulk. The seller did quote “liquidation stock” for the low price)

The latter seems unlikely, but then so does the former, considering the quality as compared to say a copied movie.
ETA: I think the last picture shows the difference best. - notails.com - photography - Isle of Man

2

People wouldn’t sell fake stuff on ebay so it’s ok.

3

There are reduced price versions, especially for teachers and lecturers.They have the full functionality of regular versions.

The discs are marked with this information ’ not for resale’ and ‘Licensed only for use by students and faculty’

It also comes up somewhere in the information, can’t remember exactly where, but then you are only supposed to be able to get them if you are registered to certain proffessional associations which have certain standards for membership.

I would not be surprised to find there are other exemptions.

4

Judging by the photos alone, it appears to be fake, but I would need microscopic shots of the hologram area to be absolutely certain.

Fake holograms are stickers.

5

Continuing, yes, counterfeiters have had the technology to produce very good looking stickers for years now. They are usually made of a metallized mylar material.

All genuine holograms, whether earlier or current, are made the same way at different factories - there are no genuine discs produced in a cheaper manner or with stickers.

Note: some of the earliest discs exhibited a hologram with a silver color (Windows 2000 and previous), but were made essentially the same way.

Again, the “gold standard” for determining whether the hologram is genuine or not is examination of the hologram itself under decent magnification.

Here’s a Microsoft site that may make identification of fakes easier:
http://www.microsoft.com/howtotell/

6

I very much suspect it is fake. I wouldn’t understand why Microsoft would bother making a disk with a holographic sticker rather than writing directly on the disk. And I don’t think even the OEM versions are released without any holography.

The quality of pirated software gets better and better by the day. That’s why so many PC developers are so paranoid about it.

7

Thanks for the reply.

I had to laugh at the ‘low grade’ samples on that page. Well… duh!
(writeable cd with ‘windows 2000’ penned on in marker.

8

Those are excellent photos. I wonder if MS might be interested? Interested enough to license them for a genuine copy, that is. :slight_smile:

9

Thanks for your comment about the photos :slight_smile: I wanted to get all CSI-IOM on their ass.
I’m not sure what you mean about Microsoft licensing them for a genuine copy.

10

In return for the rights to use those photos.