Windows 10: Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home?

Discus and support Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home? in Windows 10 Installation and Upgrade to solve the problem; Hi all. New to the site - retired engineer and long time Mac user but not a whiz. Only a few hours exploration of Win 10 so far. Thank you for the... Discussion in 'Windows 10 Installation and Upgrade' started by ondablade, Sep 5, 2016.

  1. ondablade Win User

    Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home?


    Hi all. New to the site - retired engineer and long time Mac user but not a whiz. Only a few hours exploration of Win 10 so far. Thank you for the opportunity to post a question.

    I've a new Asus UX501 VW (UK spec) notebook with 512 GB SSD, 12 GB memory and i7 2.6 GHz with OEM Win 10 home and McAfee Live Safe, and want to clean install WIn 10 Professional instead. No personal data on it to save. There's been lots written on upgrade routes, but perhaps not much on this one.

    There's excellent write ups on using Win 10 on line, but I'm struggling to pull together the steps and best sequence by which to handle the above transition. Also to understand the how and why.

    1. I'd like to keep a copy of the OEM Win 10 home installation just in case it should prove to be needed. Is saving a system image to an external HDD for safe keeping a good way to do this?

    2. Is it also necessary to also make a recovery drive (saved from the OEM set up - to a USB stick?) to facilitate getting back to the OEM set up/to permit installation of the system image/for other reasons? (guessing that the recovery partition on the notebook's SSD will end up being deleted)

    3. At what point should the Win 10 home to professional upgrade be bought, and how should the keys/activation be handled? Must the upgrade be bought and downloaded on the computer on which it will be used? One route would presumably be to buy and install an upgrade to WIn 10 pro using the notebook, activate it, and then clean install it?

    4. It'd be convenient to end up with the new/Win 10 professional clean install (the operating system) in its own partition, with the rest of the notebook's SSD available for data/personal files. Does Win 10 set up it's own partitions?

    5. The newly completed Win 10 prof clean install will presumably require its own recovery USB stick too (is this a good alternative to the usual recovery partition on the SSD?), and presumably a back up image saved to an external drive too. Is the content of these different to that for Win 10 home above?

    6. The new Windows 10 professional install will probably also set up it's own partitions on the notebook's SSD - which suggests that the SSD may end up with surplus/unused partitions requiring rationalisation. The question likely then becomes how to tell which of these can safely be removed?

    7. I'm presuming that the McAfee security willde facto be removed during the clean install, and that restoring protection will just be a matter of installing the Kaspersky Total Security? (already bought) Is Win Defender good enough to secure/make safe the transaction while buying and paying for the upgrade, and while downloading it?

    Pardon all the questions - but even a setting down the best sequence of steps would help greatly...

    :)
     
    ondablade, Sep 5, 2016
    #1
  2. kjl1956 Win User

    upgrade from win10 home to pro using a win8 product key

    I understand the upgrade path from retail or OEM .

    What I want to do is use the free upgrade from win7 home

    OEM licenses to windows 10 home licenses first.

    Then upgrade the windows 10 home OEM version to windows 10

    pro version; with the last step to win8.0 pro retail key

    On the last step above, will the licenses stay on a OEM licenses or change to retail key ????

    or is this not even achievable unless I do the install buy media, usb or dvd.

    If that is the case than doing the same method from win7 to win8.0 pro would be a more direct route; but the issue is still if I can upgrade win 7 home OEM to win 8.0 pro with a retail

    key??????

    If that is the case neither route will get the end results win7 home to win 10 pro; unless at one time I do the upgrade with media, usb or dvd, wiping what ever previous operating system was installed before that one.

    Win7 home to win10 home or win8.0 pro; then upgrade to win10 pro with a mix of OEM and retail keys.

    Thanks
     
    kjl1956, Sep 5, 2016
    #2
  3. Latest Windows 10 iso defaulting to Home, no option to install Pro

    Thank you for the info,.

    It confirms that it is impossible to do a full fresh install of 10 Pro from USB as the installer will always read the Win 8 Home serial embedded in the firmware via OEM activation 3.0.

    The only route to 10 Pro is to install 3 operating systems.

    Windows 8.1 Home

    Windows 8.1 Pro Upgrade

    Windows 10 Pro Upgrade
     
    Philip_666, Sep 5, 2016
    #3
  4. Winuser Win User

    Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home?

    Saving a image file of your original install should be enough. Most of us use Macrium Reflect to make our images. I haven't done it in awhile but I think you can upgrade from Home to Pro by changing your product key by going to Settings - Update and Security - Activation - Change product key and using your Pro product key.
     
    Winuser, Sep 5, 2016
    #4
  5. Feather Win User
    If you have an OEM computer with UEFI firmware embedded Windows 8/8.1/10 product key, the Windows setup should automatically detect product key from UEFI firmware and you will be taken straight to the License Agreement screen.

    When installing Windows 10, the Windows setup uses the following priority logic for product keys:

    1. The edition configuration (EI.cfg) file or the product ID (PID.txt) file.
    2. Product key in the UEFI firmware.
    3. Product key entry screen.

    If a key is supplied, the key is attempted to be use with the image that are available on the media being installed. If there is no product key supplied in the step 1 and step 2, you will get the product key prompt during setup.

    Or if you want to choose which one will be installed (see screenshot below), if you have an OEM computer with UEFI firmware embedded Windows 8/8.1/10 product key.

    Copy the EI.CFG file to the SOURCES folder on the USB flash drive.

    EI.CFG

    Code: [Channel] _Default [VL] 0[/quote] Before creating the "ei.cfg" file make sure its not "ei.cfg.txt", it must be "ei.cfg".


    Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home? [​IMG]


    How to Create a Bootable USB Flash Drive to Install Windows 10.

    USB Flash Drive - Create to Install Windows 10 - Windows 10 Forums

    "Option One: Use Media Creation Tool to create Bootable Windows 10 USB for Legacy BIOS and UEFI"

    For example, you want to create a 120000 MB (~120 GB) partition (see screenshots below).


    Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home? [​IMG]



    Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home? [​IMG]



    Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home? [​IMG]


    What’s the Best Antivirus for Windows 10? (Is Windows Defender Good Enough?)

    What's new in Windows Defender for Windows 10 Anniversary Update | Windows Central
     
    Feather, Sep 5, 2016
    #5
  6. ondablade Win User
    Thank you very much guys. You've gone to a lot of trouble Feather, thank you. It'll take me a little while to figure it all out, but it's coming together.
     
    ondablade, Sep 5, 2016
    #6
  7. OldMike65 Win User
    Here is a link for Macrium Reflect, its one of the Best image backup programs you could use. Also make sure if you decide to use Macrium, that you make your Media Rescue Disk on a USB stick. This allows you to boot from the rescue disk incase you can't boot unto your Windows OS.
    Macrium Reflect Free


     
    OldMike65, Sep 5, 2016
    #7
  8. essenbe Win User

    Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home?

    essenbe, Sep 6, 2016
    #8
  9. ondablade Win User
    Pardon the delay coming back guys, I've been reading. A lot. *Smile It's hard to retain it all when you don't use it regularly, but I decded that I was going to invest the time to understand Win 10 as well as I reasonably can as a user.

    Thank you both for the links. Reading lots of step by steps is dead helpful - it tends to fill in the small gaps which arise due to not being familiar with all of the terminology.

    I think I know where I'm going now, but I've been delaying for a bit while getting some malware issues on my old IMac sorted as there's Office files I need to move over and don't want to bring anything nasty with them. I accidentally clicked on a .docm attachment which was probably malware - it has the same name on it as a guy I'd been speaking to who was to mail some stuff then. I didn't look closely enough...

    I ended up installing Kaspersky Internet Security on the IMac which presuming it's doing it's job certainly seems to run very nicely - it found five nasties on the Mac. All the years of 'they don't get stuff' may yet become a problem/prove to be the cause of a sense of false security...
     
    ondablade, Apr 4, 2018
    #9
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Best route - clean install Win 10 Pro on new notebook with OEM Home?

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