No More WGA Validation Required for Internet Explorer 7

Yesterday, Microsoft came out with a big surprise for all Windows XP users. They have detached Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) validation requirement to install Internet Explorer 7 on Windows XP. Even users who are running pirated version of Windows XP will be able to install and run Internet Explorer 7 on their machine.

While most of you might probably guess that Microsoft is doing this to regain the market share lost to free alternatives like Firefox and Opera, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Here’s an excerpt from Microsoft’s Internet Explorer Blog:

Because Microsoft takes its commitment to help protect the entire Windows ecosystem seriously, we’re updating the IE7 installation experience to make it available as broadly as possible to all Windows users. With today’s "Installation and Availability Update," Internet Explorer 7 installation will no longer require Windows Genuine Advantage validation and will be available to all Windows XP users.

Step in the right direction, but too late! If Microsoft really bothered about providing the best browsing experience to users, then they would have removed it ages ago. If you look a bit deeper into browser usage statistics, you might possibly argue with me:

Browser Market Share

IE 7 has a clear lead over Firefox 2, but still falls behind IE 6. Hopefully, we’ll see the usage of IE 7 go up at the cost of IE 6. You can download Internet Explorer 7 for Windows XP SP2 from here.

[Via Neowin]

This post was published by on October 5, 2007

About the Author: Thilak Rao works as a Social Media Expert. He is one of the first professional bloggers from India, and he loves to write, travel and click photos. Follow him on Twitter @thilak

  • http://internet.blogfeedsworld.com/?p=7485 No More WGA Validation Required for Internet Explorer 7

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  • http://www.faqfc.com faqfc

    this is indeed great news. yeah i’m stuck with IE6, gonna try update to v7 soon

    thanks for the tip

  • http://www.techlivez.com Shashank

    even my original XP is still using version IE 6 because i use firefox mainly..now i will think about upgrading :)

  • http://marcvz.net/blog Marc

    Many people wanted to try IE7 when it was released but were unable to do so because of WGA. This measure is rather late because people have already forgotten IE7.

  • http://www.xpresszine.com Rajan

    @faqfc and @shashank
    Well i would suggest of not using IE7 unless it is on Vista(preloaded).
    I use WinXp(genuine :) ) and i have used IE7, and to be frank, i had the max trouble dealing with IE7.

    Moreover, your system will be leaft with extraordinary security settings once you uninstall and rollback to IE6

  • http://blog.shankarganesh.com Shankar Ganesh

    Just installed IE 7. It’s slick. It’s just slow in rendering pages.

  • http://indyankk.blogspot.com indyank

    Don’t get awed by this microsoft gimmick…you would never know what micrsoft is upto…

  • http://www.nirmaltv.com Nirmal

    I think this is a good move to increase the usage of IE, firefox seems to be increasing its share.

  • http://www.techlivez.com Shashank

    @Rajan
    I think you are talking about the IE7 beta ..IE7 should be ok.

  • fasang

    As webdesigner ie7 is a disaster, event more then ie6…

    I wonder why anyone wants to stick with that… ok there are enough css hacks arround right now for designing ‘well’ in ie6 and i bet in a year or so that will be the case to for ie7… but in the mean time, webpages design for firefox, safari and ie6 that are as STANDARD as possible will just look awfull in ie7… 2 steps forward 1 back… seems to be the case here..

    To make it free for pireted versions? People should buy or go to free resources, don’t try to get a bite out of 2!

    Gl,
    Fasang

  • http://ronaldmojica.com/ The Real Proxy

    yes i agreed with this… i dont barely use IE cause its SUCKS

  • http://techroach.com/ Sreejith

    They probably know that there are less Genuine users than dodos in this world. lol

  • http://www.xpresszine.com/ Rajan

    @faqfc and @shashank
    Well i would suggest of not using IE7 unless it is on Vista(preloaded).
    I use WinXp(genuine :) ) and i have used IE7, and to be frank, i had the max trouble dealing with IE7.

    Moreover, your system will be leaft with extraordinary security settings once you uninstall and rollback to IE6