Evaluating Software Assurance

Software Assurance (SA) on Windows 7 Professional licenses delivers technologies and rights that can help organizations deploy and maintain large numbers of PCs. SA also provides upgrade rights that can help budget and pay for migrations to future Windows versions. These benefits will be an important factor when deciding whether to include Windows in an Enterprise Agreement, and understanding the benefits can help an organization make the best use of such agreements. However, an organization considering SA on Windows also needs to weigh its benefits against its costs and against other options for upgrading Windows.

Bought with Windows 7 Professional Licenses

SA is only available for Windows 7 Professional. It is not available for other Windows 7 editions such as Ultimate or Home Premium. In general, SA must be purchased with a license, in one of the following ways.

Windows 7 Professional Upgrade licenses in volume licensing. Organizations may buy SA with Windows 7 Professional Upgrade licenses that are bought in a volume licensing program. The Windows 7 Professional Upgrade licenses a PC for Windows 7 Professional, provided that the PC already has a full license for a qualifying prior OS (such as Windows XP Professional or Windows Vista Business). When an organization covers the Windows client OS organization-wide under an Enterprise Agreement (EA) or Open Value Company-wide agreement, it is essentially committing to purchase a Windows 7 Professional Upgrade license with SA for all of its covered PCs. In other volume licensing programs, such as Select Plus and Open License, SA is optional, but can be added when the license is purchased. This enables an organization to upgrade a PC to Windows 7 and start SA coverage for that PC at any time.