Windows 10: How to move/transfer my win10 pro licence to a new machine

My HTPC fan broke the other day. Machine overheated. Unable to fix so need to buy a new PC. The HTPC had Win10 pro installed via upgrade from Win8 some years ago. Is it possible to transfer licence to new PC? Thx

:)

 

Win10 licence transfer

I have a retail licence for win10 Pro on an old machine (that is obsolete and no longer used) and I would like a clear step by step guide as to how I can transfer this to a new machine that is currently running win10 home. I've tried upgrading with a win8.1
retail key but that did not work. Contacting the local Microsoft helpline did not help either as apparently "this is no longer possible" despite the fact it is in the EULA.

Anyone know how to do this?

 

Successful transfer of Win10 Pro digital licence

Hi I would put it this way from what I have learned:
If you have a windows 7 (or presumably, 8 or 8.1) RETAIL channel licence (i.e. you had the discs and were previously able to install on new machines as you needed - uninstalling any others so that there was only one copy in use) then yes.

I had upgraded my old Win7 pro licence to Win10 Pro using the free upgrade offer from MS last year.

Now I want to use win10 pro on the new machine (which comes with Win10 Home) but I only have a digital win10 pro licence on the old machine (plus my old Win7 Pro licence).

The digital licence to win10 pro can apparently be 'transferred' to the new machine. I haven't done this yet but I am told this is effected by using a MSA (Microsoft account) and being logged into that account on both machines.

You then use the activation troubleshooter to select the licence on the old machine or alternatively performing a plain upgrade on the new machine and either entering the original win7 pro key or calling MS to activate over the telephone.

We'll see if it works. I'll post back.

 

Successful transfer of Win10 Pro digital licence

So this worked. Signed into MS on both machines, clicked change licence. After having to verify my identity on both machines, upgrade proceeded. I used my win7 pro retail key to install. When I checked the digital licence had been activated on the new machine.

Only issue was that I thought that the upgrade process had got stuck when it displayed the 'egg timer' with message 100% completed for about 45 minutes, before proceeding to update the machine to pro.

After the upgrade on new machine (digital licence transfer) I deactivated Win10 Pro on the old machine until I wipe it completely.