As reported in arstechnica - Upgrade Licenses for Vista now appear not be also to be fresh installed.

In my opinion this is wrong in so many ways - it certainally is making me reconsider my personal Vista upgrade (I was going to buy a new home PC with XP MCE, with an upgrade license to Vista included in the next 3 months.

I don’t think I’m unusal that when I install a new OS, I move all data off the box, install fresh copy, then reinstalled needed SW only. Gnerally I find this gives a significant performance boost. Installing XP, patch, installing Vista will make the whole process nasty and take longer.

Microsoft need to sort their lcensing system - to be fair, I wouldn’t even mind if my license checked to the Internet before it trying an install. All these draconian measures though just alienate me, and make me less likely to use Vista.

On a futher note, the choice between 32 bit and 64 bit Vista doesn’t appear clear to me. In my opionion, all Vista should be made to be a common platform - this 32bit/64 bit devide that exists right now is annoying - and M$ should supply both to all purchasers - as I see it right now, I have a choice.. Fact is, ideally both should be installed with option at boot as to which you want to use. Now Solaris has been able to do this for years (choice of booting 32bit/64bit kernel of OS is quite an easy procedure on Sun boxes that are 10 years old) - why can’t microsoft?