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Pirates Find Proper Way to Crack Vista's Activation Schema

Posted by Zonk on from the little-ants-can-fell-big-trees dept.

El_Oscuro writes "A genuine crack for Windows Vista has been released by pirate group Pantheon. The exploit allows a pirated, non-activated installation of Vista (Home Basic/Premium and Ultimate) to be properly activated and made fully-operational. 'It seems that Microsoft has allowed large OEMs like ASUS to ship their products with a pre-installed version of Vista that doesn't require product activation — apparently because end users would find it too inconvenient.'"

13 of 213 comments (clear)

  1. SP1 by Xenolith · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Since this article is a year old, no testing on SP1, I assume.

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    1. Re:SP1 by Tony+Hoyle · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I had that - MS have started limiting MSDN activations in Vista, whereas they never bothered in XP, so you can only have a certain number of VMs installed. Like you I keep VMs around for more than a month so need to activate - we had a whole pile of VMs go fubar on us because our MSDN sub rolled into the next year and they changed all our activaton codes overnight.

      Took the best part of a day to sort that mess out.

      Most of the office is Linux servers running VMWare and Macbooks running VMWare Fusion, to limit the amount of damage MS can do to us with this stupidity.. unfortunately for product testing you need to have some of their crap around.

  2. Inconvenience by Rik+Sweeney · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I don't know how Vista's activation works, but I imagine that you only have to type it in once. Surely they could have just asked the user to type in the key on the back of the DVD / CD case, and if they don't have a DVD / CD then to contact their OEM. Works for me.

    Unless of course Microsoft have done this on purpose to get more copies on Vista on the desktop...

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    1. Re:Inconvenience by IBBoard · · Score: 4, Interesting

      You probably would - you only typed it once for XP (unless you upgraded your machine, at which point XP thought it was a new machine and wanted re-activating). The problem with CD keys (from Microsoft's point of view) is that you can copy a key and hand it around, but you can't copy an activation code that needs to be confirmed by a remote machine.

      I'd rather have a single CD key than 35(?) characters I need to type in to the phone followed by 35(?) characters you have to type back in to your computer. I had to activate three XP laptops at work that were purchased specially for a project and that was a pain. Actually, no, I'd rather not have a CD key at all, but that's why I run Linux at home.

      One of the linked articles does cover an implicit acceptance of piracy in countries like Romania, mainly as a way to get people hooked on Windows before making them buy it (or just to keep OSS in check).

  3. Who cares... by neowolf · · Score: 1, Interesting

    I know this will likely be seen as a troll and will hit my Karma but...

    Seriously- who cares. Vista is probably the worst operating system to ever be produced (relative to others at the time), if not second behind Windows ME. My company tested it on several computers and has started removing it because it has proved to be almost unusable. It is also a technical support nightmare.

    We are actually starting to go to Macs (something I never in my life thought I'd see). I haven't been able to talk them into actually trying Linux, unfortunately, even though I've run it for a couple of years now.

    Someone should start a Web site for people to give away the Vista keys they don't want.

  4. Re:What SP1? by Gr8Apes · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Obviously I'm a little in the dark :) I've no interest in Vista other than to see it fail to become the next standard. I do not wish that for silly reasons like "MS is da evil" or anything like that, but rather because with Vista they've created essentially less of an OS, and more of a proprietary content delivery appliance disguised as a general purpose OS.

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  5. heh. by Machine9 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Am I really the only person who is not super dissatisfied with Vista? I've honestly not experienced anything negative with it. I still prefer the ubuntu installation on my laptop mind, but gamers will be gamers, and Wine hurts my brain =(

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    1. Re:heh. by BLKMGK · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Funny, I run Vista64 too, Ultimate - no issues. My XP system is dragging pretty badly though and I think I might slap Home Premium on it instead. I've found a total of two pieces of software that I'm interested in that have issues with Vista - an advanced encoding CODEC and an unsigned driver for a hardware monitor - speedfan I think. everything else has run smooth as butter and while some of the UI elements irritate me - the start menu in particular - I've found that it works great overall. Mind you I run it on a 4Ghz machine with 4Gigs of RAM so it sure as hell ought to be snappy!

      I run Ubuntu on another machine - my HTPC. I've had only a little trouble with it, digital sound disappearing twice for no reason. I have a backup image of it and can load it from scratch or backup in record time. I'm comfortable in either O/S right now. I AM seriously thinking I might try Ubuntu on a new desktop I'm planning just because Vista costs so damned much. I need to check and see if the various tools I want to run on that machine exist on Linux, I have a sneaking suspicion they do. Since it will be a box just for video encoding etc. it won't need games etc. to be loaded.

      To each his own but despite all the screeching about Vista I'm not finding it an issue and the DRM hasn't gotten in my way once despite the mountain of FUD about "tilt bits" and other horseshit. I rip HD-DVD with no problems and transcode them while playing games - no worries. I would suggest that those having issues check out how much memory they have - quite a few OEM's skimped and shipped machines with only a Gig of memory. Try two...

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    2. Re:heh. by JustNiz · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Don't hold your breath. They still can't get most DX9 games working well. Actually Wine is looking better than Cedega for DX9 gaming these days.

  6. Uh-Why would you WANT to pirate Vista? by hairyfeet · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Are you into pain or something? Why would anyone want to steal what most consider WinME II? I gave away the DVD I got for beta testing Vista,and last I heard it had already gone through at least 4 people,each having tried it for a couple of weeks and then running back to XP. It is like one of those fruitcakes that nobody wants-it just keeps getting passed around.I wonder if they have started making room in the landfill where they buried the Atari E.T. carts for all the Vista DVDs that will end up getting tossed?


    And yes,I know some folks have managed to get it to run okay.I also have a neighbor who is still using and swears by WinME,but that don't make it good. Enough folks have been burned by Vista that all the service packs in the world ain't going to help the bad experiences of way too many early adopters. I'll stick with Xandros for my laptop and XP for gaming.But you do have to admit it is a brilliant way to combat piracy,just make an OS so slow and bloated that nobody will want to steal it!

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  7. No no no... you're doing it wrong. by Puppeteer_23 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    That's not how you do it. You're supposed to talk about how THIS is the year Linux is finally going mainstream and everyone's finally going to start using it, learning the shell and modding the kernel. That, or how everyone should just buy an Apple or something. Vista's the worst thing ever, remember?

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  8. Re:... But Windows STILL not dying... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Interesting

    This 'workaround' for activation is another example of their disdain for the end user; they're willing to accomodate the manufacturers That's one way to look at it. It can also be seen as Microsoft keeping up with their tradition of making Windows particularily easy to pirate, see pirated copies of Windows are copies of Windows being used, means fewer people using something else. Windows has always been trivial to pirate. Piracy benefits Microsoft. They get their cash from the business sector. As much as MS likes piracy, they have to pretend they don't, for obvious reasons.

    I think the later both more likely and less underhanded. Why do you reckon they never fixed it? To screw you over? Don't be ridiculous, making it easy for you to circumvent it doesn't screw over the customer at all. They don't fix it, because they benefit from it.
  9. How piracy fits into adoption strategies by moxley · · Score: 2, Interesting

    One thing to always consider: Just like it always is, one way or the other piracy plays into the strategy of getting this OS adopted.

    Who cracks and/or installs pirated software? Mostly young techies. If they can get an OS for free or for cheaper than Vista, then Vista needs to be made "free" to compete in that sector - However, you can't just make the product free or reduce the price point, because that is only going to get you less money from people who are going to pay for it anyway and won't affect those who acquire software activations via other means.

    MS knows that people who are going to pirate are generally not going to pay for an OS, and certainly not full price, and some people would pirate even if it cost $2.99.

    I would think that one of the worst things that could happen to a new OS is to be rejected by the young technically savvy users - for so many reasons, but one reason is because they influence adoption; especially upgrades and new system purchases. Do you know when my parents and pretty much every other non-techie person I know decides to upgrade their OS, or buy anything computer related? After they ask my advice (or whoever they consider to be the most computer savvy person in their life). I am sure it is the same for a lot of us here.

    Certainly I used to use pirated stuff sometimes before I could afford MSDN or worked in places that provided all the legit software I needed. I am not posting about whatever piracy is right or wrong here, that has been debated endlessly and it's a personal choice. One thing I can say is that (with the exception of a few times I have seen legit copies of Vista deactivate) it certainly is a lot less of a pain in the ass to use properly activated software.

    I wonder though - if you plotted the adoption rate of Vista on a graph against MS expectations, my guess is that the further below expectations the adoption rate is, the less stringent activations are going to be and more cracks and workarounds (that work well) you're going to see.