Is it possible to download vista legally?

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NickT916

New Member
I bought a laptop SZ650N Sony wich comes preloaded with vista from the factory and it doesnt come with a vista CD just the vista CD key. Well i thought id give it a shot and downgrade to XP pro, but there is about 20 different things i gotta download to make XP fully functional on this laptop, so i got tired of that idea and now am thinking about going back to vista but there is no reason for me to buy vista since i already have legally bought it with the laptop. does sony offer this on their site if you provide serial number of the laptop or anything?
 
Well since you are not looking for the CD Key, I guess and I hope this is OK to answer.
Please try here or better here.
I am not sure is it free, but you can look.
 
It's not that you have to download and install drivers if you use XP, it's that the OEM copy of Vista that came with your laptop came with drivers pre-installed. You'd have to install drivers with any OS aside from the prepackaged one, including a new version of Vista.

Moreover, you can't use your Sony OEM CD key with any other version of Vista, Business or otherwise.

It's likely that since your laptop didn't include a backup CD, it had a backup partition on your hard drive. You may want to see if that still exists, but you probably killed it installing XP. Sony will have backup disks, but they'll probably try to charge you for them unless you make up a story as to why your backup partition getting wiped out wasn't your fault.

In the future, with a prebuilt machine, you'll usually find some kind of disk creator software that you can use to make your own backup disks instead of relying on the partition.
 
NickT916 said:
thanks for the link, i came down to this http://www.windowsmarketplace.com/content.aspx?ctId=404&tabid=1 it says i need the 25 character key, im assuming they mean the key that i already have, unless they only provide these backup CDs to those who have bought it online and downloaded vista??

also, i have Vista Business key, so if i instead want vista home or ultimate i wont be able to use my business key correct?
Click to expand...

Exactly...but at least it's free :D
 
yea that site only sell your copy of vista if bought from them as a doanload and such... i would have to find another route for this situation of mine... coughtorrentcough!!@#
 
..You should probably read my above response before you waste your time downloading an OS that you can't use, and even if you can (illegally), will still have to install "like 20 things" before it will work.

Here's a recap, just in case:

You can not use your OEM CD-key with any version of Windows other than Sony's OEM version.
 
fortyways said:
..You should probably read my above response before you waste your time downloading an OS that you can't use, and even if you can (illegally), will still have to install "like 20 things" before it will work.

Here's a recap, just in case:

You can not use your OEM CD-key with any version of Windows other than Sony's OEM version.
Click to expand...

yea i saw that, witch means i can use it with vista business, since it came with the laptop, but no CD... right? last time i remember you can install same XP CD on as many computers as you want, as long as you got that many CD keys
 
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