If anybody needs Win 7 disk ISO's Digital River has put the links up again. HeiDoc.net has put up a page with links as well. Seems to be a fairly complete list of version ISO's.

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Fantastic. Thanks for the tip!

Does Microsoft still sell Windows 7 keys to the public?

Great!

Now if only they would post the ISO files for Windows 8/8.1...

Not sure what MS sells now but if you don't have a Win 7 key you could opt for the 32 bit OEM System Builder DVD or the 64 Bit OEM System Builder DVD that can be bought from Amazon and other sources. Best I could do, have not tried it. =)

or . . go with the 8.1 OEM System Builder DVD ???

Thanks for looking, but that downloader does not work with OEM keys... and buying another OEM license to access the bits is a bit too much. But thanks for reporting!

Probably somewhere down the line they do/might, but in any case I found my unused Windows 7 key finally. Lost it for a while. :D

But so.. what are those ISOs for?
Anyway, I'd download them if I could still buy a retail key..

Windows 7's official downloads are standard ISOs so anyone can get them for use with a valid license; Windows 8 onwards use a dedicated downloader which prompts for the product key before downloading and does not accept any OEM keys (even though they are otherwise valid for activating Windows), so OEM and System Builder users can't use it to get the files for reinstalling and so forth.

Wow, another -1 for Win8, then?
Do you know if it's even still possible to create custom unattended installations like in WinXP or Win7? (NLite and RTSe7enLite)

Not really, the Digital River ISOs were intended for those buying Windows as a direct download from the Microsoft Store. Microsoft never did anything to prevent them being readily used, probably because they still require valid licenses anyway, but this was never an intended distribution method for non-Store users. OEM users are expected to get replacement media from the system manufacturer since this sort of support is their responsibility, not Microsoft's. This also applies to those using System Builder versions under the Personal Use License (since in that case you're your own OEM). Windows 8.1 retail media is always full version media, so if you opt for retail you can both do clean installs of Windows and have a key that is valid for the downloader.

I haven't tried unattended setup for Windows 8/8.1 but it won't have changed since those features are central to OEM and business deployment. That said I certainly wouldn't use such methods to actually remove default features from Windows since programs can rely on them in expected or unexpected ways, including many games (e.g. some games rely on Windows Media Player's native components for WMV cutscenes).

Ahem, you know, Windows 7 ISO disks will probably be available for download *forever* on the Ol'Pirate Bay and whatnot.....

Take a look over at MDL. Seems to be possible, but you'll have to dig around a bit deeper for more information.
Yeap, same is true for all of GOG games as well. Why get them from GOG instead?

Pretty much. WDS capture and deployment is almost exactly the same as it is with Windows 7. System Center works as well, but I've never tried deploying any other OS than Win 8 Enterprise with SCCM.

One of the perks with being a student where I am is that I get to download ISOs of any Microsoft OS for free through Dreamspark, so getting Windows 8 isos isn't that big of a problem. Windows 8.1 seemingly forces you to create a Microsoft account when you boot it up for the first time, but if you click "create a new account"(or something similar), you'll find an option to just use a local account.