Quick Question

[ming]

What are the differences (in any) between RTM and retail versions of an OS?

 

[Xie]

What are the differences (in any) between RTM and retail versions of an OS?

you mean OEM?

 

[SPeedY_B]

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.

 

[Xie]

oh .. some manufactures change things so it'll only run on there hardware and add in there own stuff as well.

 

[ming]

So are you saying that there is NO difference between the two in ANY way whatsoever? (apart from the Activation part for corp and retail of course).

 

[NetRyder]

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.