Microsoft Retail Agreements, Software Maintenance, and Software Upgrades/Downgrades

Microsoft retail use rights do not include upgrade or downgrade rights: what you bought is all you get, although you may be able to transfer the software from one machine to another.

With a Microsoft Retail Agreement, you may have the opportunity to purchase reduced-cost upgrades to later versions. If you choose to do this, you can usually choose to run either the older copy of the software or the newer copy of the software on a single machine: you cannot run both versions on different machines at the same time. You can, however, transfer the software from one machine to another (example: if you buy a replacement machine).

To reflect this process in Purchasing, and to get License Analytics to better determine your compliance status, follow these steps to handle a retail channel upgrade purchase:
  1. Uninstall the old version of the software.
  2. Install the new version.
  3. In the Purchasing console, create an order and a software purchase line item for the upgrade. (You may want to add a note about the order date for the upgrade.)
  4. Associate the new line item with the Retail predefined contract.
  5. Edit the original line item and set its quantity to zero.

Next: Microsoft OEM Agreements, Software Maintenance, and Software Upgrades