Windows 10: Will windows 10 update provide a product key for clean install?

Activation is not tied to your MSA. You are not required to use an MSA with Windows 10. If that were the case, you simply wouldn't be able to upgrade if you weren't using one.

What appears to be happening is this. Upon the first upgrade, MS sends your old Windows 7/8.x key to the activation servers, along with the current hardware hash. MS keeps this information, so further re-installs on the same machine are automatically activated without a key.

If your key is a retail key, you can transfer this to a new machine by re-installing Windows 7/8.x and performing the upgrade again, the activation servers will already know you have upgraded the 7/8.x key and, even though it's new hardware, it will still automatically activate, because they will know that the original 7/8.x key Is marked as being upgraded.

 

This is interesting and helpful information. As it looks now, my rig is lost in limbo and my laptop can't even get the basic Windows GUI functions to work. What are my options here? The rig was registered for an upgrade but has since been lost in limbo (I am still trying to figure out what the heck happened all of the sudden). Laptop upgraded within thirty minutes of restarting from 8.1 to begin the 10 upgrade. I'm essentially without a machine sans my work laptop.

 

Thank you for that information. I tried to upgrade my sisters laptop with the 10240 build that came out earlier in the month. I installed it on mine and hers on the same day (7/18/2015).

The difference being:
I told win10 upgrade to keep everything on mine - activated with no problems
I told win10 upgrade to keep nothing on my sisters - not activated

Both of us were running windows 7 Ultimate, she had her notification thing in the taskbar like I did, any idea on what to do next to get her win10 activated?

 

hmmm i have multiple comupters that uses same microsoft account. and i updated all to windows 10 from 8.1...
do you think all my windows 10 has their own product key own its own?

 

You're going to have to roll back and perform the upgrade again, keeping everything. You can re-install clean again after that.

 

I have Samsung NP-RV 515 A01US. I install Samsung recovery solutions 5 and rolled back to windows 7. I had a clean install of 7 no issues. I then upgraded to windows 10. No key asked when I did so. I put very few programs before and after the upgrade. So its not clean but very little is installed. Plus windows.old folder does not slow things down or affect performance I read somewhere. And I am using the original hd. Not sure how much life is left in the hd but it pretty smooth so not bad. So its not clean but pretty close and I don't even notice.

 

Hi there. I have split my SSD in two partitions as soon as I got wind that Win10 would be free. So I did a dual boot with Windows 7 and 8.1. It updated the 8.1 into Win10. But now it's requesting me to update Win7. Which is weird since it's the same SSD and the same laptop... Should I update Win7 or just deny it? Is it even possible to have two Win10 Pro on the same machine? (Not that I want it. I wanna keep Win7 intact).
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Sure, as long as Win 7 and Win 8.1 were legitimate and activated, both can be upgraded.
I don't see the point though. I would keep 7 and dual boot 7 and 10 as needed/wanted.
Two bootable versions of 10 on one computer doesn't seem very useful to me.

 

Another thing. I don't own a small business or a big one for that matter. But, I have always used Win 7 Pro which as to (me) is still a very stable OS. Even more than Ultimate. Now with this Win10 Pro version, some say is for small business only. Can we expect the same level of stability with win10 pro version? Or should I buy a Win7 home key and update into win10 home? (I know Win7 keys aren't sold anymore, but I have a friend who still has like 15 of'em or so to sell).

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Pro and Home are identical except for a few features Pro can do that Home can't. The main one for me is gpedit (Group Policy Editor) which I like to have available.

I think as far as stability they will be the same. If you have Pro, stay with Pro.

 

MS notified I qualify to upgrade my Win8.1 Laptop and will advise me by email. Whats in this email? Do they send a key? Meanwhile I have done a clean install of Windows 10 making a dual boot thus leaving my Win 8.1 alone ie.have not upgraded its partition. Ok so far so good but MS keep prompting me to activate. I dont have key that works.

Why no auto activation for my set up? They already know I qualify so must have recorded my Win8.1 key and hardware config!
I dont want to overwrite my original installation of Win8.1 with Win 10.


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You must first upgrade Windows 8.1 to Windows 10.

1. Do a clean installation of Windows 8.1 to another partition or hard drive to create a dual boot setup.

- How to download and clean install Windows 8.1 if you have an OEM computer with UEFI firmware (BIOS) embedded Windows 8/8.1 product key. -> link

2. Check that Windows 8.1 is activated.

3. There is no need to install updates from Windows Update in Windows 8.1.

4. Create a Windows 10 installation media (USB/DVD/ISO) using the Windows 10 Media Creation Tool.

5. Upgrade Windows 8.1 to Windows 10 from Windows 10 USB/DVD/ISO.

For example:
- In Windows 8.1, mount the Windows 10 ISO image file by right-clicking the ISO image file and choosing Mount. If you don’t see Mount command from the context menu, go to Open with -> Windows Explorer instead.
- Run the setup (setup.exe) file to start Windows 10 Setup.

6. After the installation of Windows 10, check that Windows 10 is activated.

 

Just a quick question on this subject. I have found the above info to be correct - ran the Win10 upgrade from my Windows7 pc, allowed it to activate and then performed a clean install from the DVD and Windows 10 activated OK - I always prefer to take the time to do a fresh install.

However, as Windows 10 doesn't seem to support my motherboard raid feature I have re-installed Windows 7 whilst I then work out where to go from here. Is there likely to be any time requirement for me to upgrade now that I have done the upgrade & activate ? Just curious if once the free upgrade offer expires, if all will be ok should I think do a clean install of the OS

Regards

 

Once the upgrade to Windows 10 is activated on that computer it is good for the life of that same computer and can be re-installed without a product key and will activate as long as a major hardware component is not changed which will change the hardware ID. So far only motherboard changes have produced a new hardware ID.

 

I have done precisely that. Two copies of Windows 10 Pro on the same computer. One is running the mainstream and one the Insider. The second did not have to be an upgrade. It was a clean install. One license covers both, unlike previous versions of Windows that required separate licensing. That's one of the implications of the new licensing technology, Device Activation.