One must not forget that everything that can be stuffed into an EULA regardless of its enforceable legality is often put into it simply to have it there for people to have conversations like this, and to attempt to get a few more peope to do things exactly as the company would prefer, an EULA is often simply packed with crap to be used as a deterrant.
To violate an EULA is not necessarily to break the law, it depends upon the laws in your country, and whether or not the EULA actually reflected something those laws enforce, also in some places, some EULAs would be considered essentially illegal except for the fact that the end user has agreed to them.
However, when you purchase a piece of software, at least in America, you have actually purchased the right to use it on ONE machine. A backup is considered acceptable, but a backup would not be installed on another machine(as this would be using it on 2 machines), it would have to be kept on some form of media, of course, these days even making a backup copy in some cases is illegal here.
The legality of purchasing an OS, and using it on a computer for which the EULA does not specify as 'acceptable hardware', is probably going to vary widely from country to country as to whether or not it is a legal or enforceable thing, I am not a copyright lawyer and could not tell you as such.
However, these days in America at least, modifying an OS so that it can be run on another machine could be interpreted as a violation of the DMCA which has some pretty rough associated punishments due to our retarded government that cares nothing for its people.
I would assume in America if the OS will install on its own onto the given hardware, that there's probably nothing the comapny can do about it, but if it has to be modified there will definitely be some trouble.
