Windows 10: Computer unexpectedly restored Win 8.1 - can I upgrade to Win10 again?

Yesterday a friend's computer (Windows 10 auto upgrade from 8.1, years ago) suddenly refused the (only) user password, probably due to a failed update (Windows or Office365).

Of course, no pwd recovery disk, it's a local account etc.

After some wizardry I managed to log in and now I realize that the computer automagically returned to the original Windows 8.1 !

The machine behaves strangely, a.o. there is a DELL backup/restore process that keeps eating most of the disk I/O each time the system is restarted - so it's probably a good idea to give it a fresh start.

I have backed up the data to an external drive and would like to install a fresh Win10 on this system.

Problem: the system shipped with Win 8.1 and that is now the version that is running after the mysterious silent system restore of yesterday; I guess this is also the version of the factory image in the OEM recovery partition.

Question: now that the free Win10 upgrade window is over, how can I reinstall Win10 on this computer ? That version was running until the problems of yesterday.


More generally: how do people manage situations where a reset to an old Windows version (factory image/DVD) is necessary due to disk crash etc, after a successful free upgrade to Win10 and a Win10 image backup is not available ?

:)

 

My new Vista computer sometimes unexpectedly shuts off. Any suggestions?

My new Vista computer sometimes unexpectedly shuts off. Any suggestions?

 

Laptop with free Win10 upgrade crashed, restored laptop but it re-installed Win 8 (previous to upgrade). How to get Win10 back?

My HP laptop with free Win10 upgrade crashed, it had Win8 earlier. I restored the laptop from HP recovery tool but it re-installed Win 8 (previous to upgrade). How to get Win10 back?

 

Why does HP and other retailers still sell win7/8.1 and upgrade to win10? what happens if the mb is replaced by warranty after 1 year?

actually, the new motherboard from warranty service replacement also has an OEM key.

this year alone, I am in the third year of warranty for a hp elite 8300, the motherboard was replaced. I had to perform an upgrade from windows 8.1 to windows 10 for the 2nd time then perform a restore from image backup of my harddisk.

(

step 1: image harddisk containing win10 upgraded from win8)

step 2: install win 8

step 3: upgrade win 8 to win10, activate

step 4, restore harddisk from image

)

the point being, this procedure will no longer be applicable once the free upgrade period is expired.

ie: if a buy a hp/dell pc right now that only comes with win7/8.1, in the 2nd year of warranty, i no longer can upgrade from win7/win8.1 after the warranty replacement of a motherboard)