Cores, more cores and licensing
The otherday I wrote a bit on the licensing changes around Windows 2003 R2 EE, DE and virtualization. Well licensing is something that is always causing confusion and multi-core processors just add to that confusion. Well our friends in Redmond have a page up to help explain the licensing requirements for multi-core systems. In a nutshell
- licenses are based on sockets, or physical processors
- one license per socket, not per core
- XP Home can support a single multi-core processor
- XP Pro can support dual multi-core processors
You can find out more at the Multicore Processor Licensing page. And for more on licensing in general you can find out more at the Licensing Home Page.