Why does MS charge $50 for OneCare renewal when copy is $15? (1 Viewer)

[Dennis Nicholls]

There's something I just don't get about Microsoft.....

My MS Win Live OneCare license expires in September. I keep getting prompts about renewing my license for another year for $50.

But you can buy a brand new upgraded copy at Costco for $15, which includes an in-store mfg. rebate of $35 from list price. Heck if you aren't a Costco member you can get it from Amazon for $20.

What is Microsoft's problem? You would think they would save money by letting you renew your coverage online rather than going to their expense of manufacturing a box, manual, and disc and then having to deal with retailers. A normal person would guess that the online renewal would be cheaper than just purchasing a new updated copy.

I bought the new v. 2.0 copy from Costco today and will install it the day before my subscription expires.....

 

[Johnny Angell]

I think they are depending on customers not knowing any better and also the convenience of an online renewal. Just about anything you might want to buy these days can be found for a better price with a little research, but many won't do it.

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

It turns out that there are some hiccups in installing a new store-bought copy and MS doesn't give any hints. You have to deinstall the old copy, and then install the new copy making sure you use yet another new hotmail email account. If you reuse your existing hotmail account you never get the prompt to enter the new access code.

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

Well there's now a new twist in the story.

MS OneCare is being replaced by MS Security Essentials (MSE), which is a free program. MSE was released in beta this week and quickly "sold out" the 75K beta downloads. MS OneCare is being removed from retail sales on 30 June - I wouldn't buy one now or renew your subscription if I were you. :rolleyes

OneCare was a helpful combination of anti-virus, auto backup, auto defrag, etc. and all MSE will give you is the anti-malware portion. No big deal for me, but I wonder why MS just didn't make OneCare into the free version.

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

The story keeps getting stranger and stranger.

MS is being tight-lipped about the formal release date for MSE. However I need to know since my subscription to OneCare is set to expire on 17 September.

A month or two ago, the window for OneCare showed a box at lower left indicating how long until my subscription expired, and the box contained a pushbutton to go to a site to pay for a renewal.

A few weeks ago this box dropped the pushbutton, and merely said my subscription would expire on 17 Sept. I went to the MS main site and tried to buy a renewal for OneCare, but their own site wouldn't allow it.

Today there's a new message. The box now states "Your subscription will renew in 17 days".

How's that going to happen? MS has no credit card info for me so I guess they are going to "unlock" all pending subscriptions to OneCare up until the release date of MSE.

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

A MS rep on MS's own user forum said that all OneCare subscriptions that expire after about mid-May 2009 will be automatically extended for free for 6 months until after mid-November. Presumably the release date for MSE will occur during the launch of Windows7 on 22 October 2009, and you will be able to replace OneCare with MSE at that time.