Are these prices legal?

[bobdog]

So I've bought some online games from G2A, and I came across this link for Microsoft Windows 8.1 Professional 32/64 Bit CD-KEY GLOBAL for $19: https://www.g2a.com/windows-8-professional-32-64-bit-cd-key-global.html

My question is, how does this work? I've currently got Win Vista and have been thinking about upgrading to Win 8, but everything I see is either $99 or $179. So how can this be just $19, and would it really upgrade me?

[Silver Sorrow]

Not that this is relevant to your post, but in the case of Win 8.1...I'd recommend Win 7. 

[Starfox]

I've no idea if this price is legal or how it works. However that wouldn't totally surprises me considering the utter pain in the ass for Microsoft trying to push users to adopt Windows 8. The rejection is so huge that most computers builders propose their new rigs in two flavors, one with Windows 8.1 for those who really want it and the same but with Windows 7 for most people. Microsoft even withdrew the selling of complete Windows 7 copies... One only finds OEM copies nowadays so you can only legally own them by buying hardware. And still the rejection toward Win 8 remains. Even Microsoft Store continues to sell upgrades between Windows 7 versions instead of pushing people to jump directly to 8.

The situation is such that officially "Windows 8 licenses acquired through an OEM may be downgraded to the equivalent edition of Windows 7. Customers licensed for use of Windows 8 Enterprise are generally licensed for Windows 8 Pro, which may be downgraded to Windows 7 Professional." Yep, it's a situation where MS had to allow downgrading of the OS. You don't come with this kind of measure when the majority of your customers are OK with the new OS. So they keep selling Windows 7 in OEM version and allow downgrading but at the same time they of course will do anything possible to push people to adopt the new system.

Licenses of Windows Phone 8 are free for manufacturers (in an attempt from MS to go against Android) so I imagine that breaking the price in a few promo cases of Windows 8 is OK, especially because it doesn't sell as well as they expected.

I have Windows Phone 8 on my cellphone and it's quite OK... but my cellphone has a touch screen, I don't use it continually and I don't have that many programs installed on it. I don't even want to think about having just thirty games installed and trying to launch one of them with Win 8 Metro interface. potential nightmare ahead.

Unfortunately I guess that at one point we'll have to make do with it... because MS doesn't show any sign to abandon the "Metro" concept -- they are so focused on tablets and cellphones currently that they can't imagine their OS may be a pain in the ass when used on anything else. Seriously when everyone was criticizing Metro on the release of Win 8 MS was like "How can you not love that? There are tiles! Multicolored tiles man! With a wavy move!". They should stop smoking the carpet.

But again, I don't do a generalization; If I had to buy a tablet then I would go with Win 8... A desktop? Just NO. Next time maybe they'll make the effort to have both Metro and the old interface ready and to let the user decide following his needs and rig (after all Linux has been following this way for at least a decade and a half). THAT would be a stellar design decision.

[bobdog]

For some reason I thought Win 7 was for the touchscreens and MS had opened up Win 8 or 8.1 to offer both touchscreen and old-fashioned options. Am I wrong?

Regardless, these prices are only for downloads. Can you download Windows, or does it require a disk?

[Starfox]

For some reason I thought Win 7 was for the touchscreens and MS had opened up Win 8 or 8.1 to offer both touchscreen and old-fashioned options. Am I wrong?

It's the other way around. Windows 7 has an upgraded but still traditional interface (essentially resemble Vista but with more features and significantly more performances and a more flexible UAC). There is an optional component for addressing touch screens but it's not enabled by default.

Windows 8 was designed primarily for touch screens. You can use it with a combo mouse+keyboard but it feels awkward (at least it does for me). Windows 8.1 is an attempt from Microsoft at gaining back the favors of those that use mouse+keyboard. Essentially Windows 8 is designed for touch screens, communications, social networking and such with tiles that can be easily manipulated with a finger even on small cellphone screens. There is some sort of "desktop" but it has been stripped of all the interesting functions present in Win 7. The latest figures are that Windows (all versions) power about 92% of the computers across the world; Windows 8 and 8.1 power about 13-14% (as of July 2014). Indeed the number of computers on which Windows 8 is installed has even lowered since the initial release (a lot of people went back to Windows 7).

Windows 9 (at least the preview we have) abandon the Windows 8 metro concept. Apparently Metro will still be present but as a "feature" integrated into a more classic desktop (which ironically enough has the same color scheme as Windows XP)...

Despite that I wouldn't describe Windows 8 as a bad OS -- once again it's perfectly fine... on my cellphone. It's just that MS took a step too far believing that suddenly all the users only had touch-screens at their disposal while touch screens still represent a very small fraction of desktop or even laptop computers (even if it represents most cellphones). Indeed MS seemed to believe that Mass Effect was the present  Say, in 10 years maybe that will be the time for Win 8... but not now.

Regardless, these prices are only for downloads. Can you download Windows, or does it require a disk?

You don't need a disk if you perform an upgrade from a previous version of Windows (the components of the new version are downloaded via MS site and installed automatically). You still need a DVD or a bootable USB key in case of a new install.