SPeedY_B said:
RTM = Release to manufacturers. This is sometimes a corporate edition that does not require a CD-key (imagine installing thousands of copies and needing a unique key for all.. heh) and is "released" before the retail version.
I think, anyway.
Hmm...I think what you're refering to there is the OEM version. That is what system manufacturers like Dell, IBM, HP etc would use to mass-install the OS on all their machines.
As far as I know, an RTM version of an operating system is just the stage after the Release Candidate (RC) builds that's released to the public as a final build. So Build 2600 of XP would be considered an RTM copy of XP, even if you bought a boxed version from a retail store.
The so-called Corporate (or Corp) edition of XP is just another name for a copy of XP with a Volume License Key (VLK). For these versions, you would still need a CD-key, but there would be no activation.