boot camp - Activation of Bootcamped Windows 7 in VMWare Fusion, is it legal?

07
2014-07
  • Questioner

    I have bought a boxed version of Windows 7 Home Premium (not OEM). I want to install this on new iMac via bootcamp but I also want to use this Bootcamped partition via VMWare Fusion.

    VMWare fusion has article about activating bootcamped windows installation.

    Does this work setup work for you? Is it ok according to license?

    • Answers
  • ta.speot.is

    The only mention of "virtual" in the EULA is this section:

    d. Use with Virtualization Technologies. Instead of using the software directly on the licensed computer, you may install and use the software within only one virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system on the licensed computer. When used in a virtualized environment, content protected by digital rights management technology, BitLocker or any full volume disk drive encryption technology may not be as secure as protected content not in a virtualized environment. You should comply with all domestic and international laws that apply to such protected content.

    To me this reads that as long as you are only running one instance of the virtual machine (don't start VMware Fusion twice or something like that) you can switch between your license to use the software in VMware Fusion (as identified by the EULA above) and your license to use the software on a physical machine as often as you want (since it is the same licensed copy you paid for).

    If you get stuck, you can send an email to [email protected] and see what they say. Note that when I have contacted their licensing support in the past they were pretty clueless about virtualisation except to say that they highly recommend you use Hyper-V over VMware.


    • Related Question

    How to activate Windows twice in VMware Fusion?
  • Questioner

    I have Windows 7 (professional OEM) installed in Boot Camp. Not thinking about it, I activated it running in VMware Fusion.

    Now in Fusion everything is fine, but when I run it directly it says it needs activation.

    I read that one actually needs to activate it directly first, and afterwards in Fusion.

    How can I fix this situation?


    • Related Answers
  • Chealion

    Install the VMWare Tools to avoid this - one of the features of VMWare Tools is to help avoid this situation - you'll need to activate in Boot Camp, then activate in Fusion with VMWare Tools installed.

    See the following KBase articles at VMWare for more information:

  • quack quixote

    Call up Microsoft and pay for a second license for the second activation.

    Better yet, don't activate the same install in Fusion. Windows sees completely different hardware when booted as a virtual machine than it does when booted on bare metal (eg, via BootCamp), so may make changes to your install that will require "fixing" when you try to boot to it directly.

    Ideally, you'd want to run separate Win7 installs in Fusion and BootCamp -- obviously this will take up additional drive space.