FS-ML403 Xilinx Embedded Development Kit with Virtex-4 FX12

If you installed and activated them, they expired 12 months after that install date, and are no longer licensed to create new designs anyway.

Hmmm...I did activate it when I received it back ~2006, but I just did a fresh install on a new PC (requiring me to re-submit to Xilinx for a new registration key based on the license key I received with the kit), and it worked just fine. I was able to create a project for the Virtex 5 LX220 (the largest part supported by ISE 8.2).

So both the EDK and the ISE software is fully functional in all aspects, but you're saying it isn't "officially" licensed for new designs since 12 months have passed since activating it. I suppose that is possible (as you indicated, after 12 months I no longer received the free ISE/EDK updates...the kit originally shipped with ISE/EDK 7.1 or so, and I received the 8.1 and 8.2 updates over the course of the next 12 months after receiving the kit). I'm not an expert on Xilinx software policy...the best I can tell you is that it is still fully functional (and that Xilinx had no issue providing a registration key for the license for it).

Regards, John Orlando