As title, if you buy this from say Amazon, do you have to authenticate it via Microsoft or is it a case of saying out loud "I am a student" and hitting Install?

Im going to burn in hell? Its not for me anyway.

Whether you buy a  S/T edition without pedagogical intent, or steal Office from teh internet, you have little to worry about, unless youre a business that can be "audited" by MSs pikelhaubed minions.

You get a coupon. You send it back with details of your institution filled in. They check, they then send you out a copy of the software.

My local Costco sells the S/T edition without any strings that I saw. :shrug:

I cant see mention of a coupon in any reviews or sites that sell it..

They do the cupons with some versions (some NHS staff get this for Ã,£15), dunno about the student version though.  I thought it was just a cutdown version on the normal one, sold a bit cheaper  :?

Quote from: CeathreamhnanI cant see mention of a coupon in any reviews or sites that sell it..

Phone up/email to check?

AFAIK, anybody can grab the ~$125 S/T edition for home use, but you can get even deeper discounts at University and school bookstores--where indeed youll need to show ID.

From the MS website: This edition of Microsoft Office gives students, teachers, and families the most used Office programs at a special price.

families if your child is in a place of education.

Office 97 was a coupon scheme, and office 2003 when I joined uni was a coupon in a box (not known for sure as I didnt have it but its what I heard on the grapevine as it were)

You get it... send it off, my 97 one needed a letter from my school on letterheaded paper.

Then you get a disk sent through the post about 10 days later.

I know a few people who got a technet sub so they could get vista & office 2007 for the price of a sub - substantially less than the real deal...

Didnt pay for mine myself as I went to the launch!

the msdn alliance you can get it for free.

I think that most software ms or not is overpriced and would sell much better at a low price so much better that they would earn about the same and there would be less cracking
and pirating.

maybe the cheapest way is to become a microsoft partner then get an action pack... you get lots more with it too.

https://partner.microsoft.com/UK/40016455

Matt