Windows 10: Win 7 Pro to Win 10 upgrade questions

I bought a laptop 5 years ago that came with a Win 10 Pro license which at that time I wasn't ready to upgrade to, so I had the manufacturer downgrade the OS install to Win 7 Pro. I now want to upgrade this older, but still capable laptop to have as a second computer - I have 1 year old Win 10 Pro laptop.


I've read and been told I could perform this upgrade "in place", meaning that it would only be an OS upgrade and that my apps and data would remain in tact,If I have the Windows Product Key which I do not. I called the manufacturer Lenovo and was told that the product key is on the motherboard and there's no way they can provide it. I was also told to do the upgrade I can order a recovery media from them at a cost, but this would require a full install of Windows 10 wiping out all apps, data, etc. Here are my questions:

• I failed to ask Lenovo if the product key is physically printed on the motherboard or if this is kept in memory on the board. If the latter, if I run the in place upgrade would the program find the product key in memory? If that's not the case and I'm prompted and cannot enter a valid product key, can I back out and return to my functioning Win 7 Pro with all apps and data in place?
• If I order a new Win 10 license, can I do the in place upgrade using it's Product Key? Or is the only way I can upgrade is to do a full install?
• Is there any way to actually talk to a Microsoft tech, or is this the only possible means to getting answers?!

Thanks in advance to anyone responding - much appreciated.

:)

 

DOWNGRADE TO WIN 7 ULTIMATE and UPGRADE TO WIN 10 PRO

I refer to the following Microsoft Community Team’s query:

“……Remember that question you asked on
Microsoft Community a few days ago?

Title:
DOWNGRADE TO WIN 7 ULTIMATE and UPGRADE TO WIN 10 PRO

We noticed that the question hasn't been marked as Answered yet and we were wondering if you resolved the issue.

• No, my question is not answered.
  Reply to provide an update or ask for more help.
• Yes, my question is answered.
  Mark the most helpful post as the Answer.
• Help us improve the community.
  Take a 1-minute survey on your community experience.”

The issue “DOWNGRADE TO WIN 7 ULTIMATE and UPGRADE TO WIN 10 PRO” is unanswered. The suggestion to refer to the link

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windows-10-specifications does not answer my query as well. I knew the prerequisites of upgrading to Win 10 from either Win 7 Ultimate or Win 8.1 Home as I have read the min. requirements/machine
specifications to upgrade directly either from the aforesaid OSes beforehand. The issue is whether from Win 8.1 Home downgrade to Win 7 Ultimate and from thereafter upgrade to Win 10 Pro possible without technicality issues. Nevertheless, since I cannot wait
for either a reply to the abovementioned issue (or my reservation to upgrade from Win 8.1 Home), I then gathered/downloaded bits and pieces of probable drivers for my machine, formatted my HDD (1TB) for more than 18 hours, clean install Win 7 Ultimate SP1,
activated using my previously purchased license and ran Windows afterwards, ran updates until repetitive error (around 25 KB updates failed to install many times) popped up during tiresome cyclic updates process. Fed-up with the errors after failed tries to
source answers from Microsoft Community, I tried my luck by upgrading to Win 10 Pro. After couple of days, viola, I have upgraded to Win 10 Pro finally, whew! Now I am running this machine with Win 10 Pro for a couple of days now, being up to date and running
very well. Hopefully no problem/s will arise.

Thank to those suggestions though.

 

upgrade Win 7 Pro to Win 10 Pro

I have several times tried to upgrade my desktop (dual boot Win XP and Win 7 Pro) to Win 10 Pro using the downloaded ISO file, and keep my personal files and apps. It runs about 36 hours then fails. How can I make this upgrade? If not using the ISO file
is there another method to accomplish this ??

Thanks for suggestions.

 

How do I upgrade from Win 10 Home to Win 10 Pro, after upgrading from Win 7 Home Premium to Win 10 Home?

I have a 4-computer home network. 3 are upgraded from Win 7 Pro to Win 10 Pro. The 4th is a Toshiba L775D-S7222 which upgraded from Win 7 Home Premium to Win 10 Home. All are 4 computers are Build 18362, which is apparently also called 1903.

The 3 computers with Win 10 Pro can access the 2T Dynex HD hanging of a Netgear N900 Dual Ban Gigabit Router WNDR4500x2. The Toshiba can not.

The issue has something to do with the inability of the Toshiba (Win 10 Home) not being able to map to the 2T Dynex in Windows Explorer. The weblink that arises states the SBM1 communications software is obsolete and that SBM2 or SBM3 is required.

I have communicated with a local computer technician, who suggested upgrading to Windows 10 PRO for this machine because "there is better network support in Win 10 Pro".

Is there some reasonable "incremental price" that I could pay to upgrade the existing Win 10 HOME to PRO? Or, is there a sofware fix to eliminate my problem that would permit me to continue using Win 10 HOME?

Please suggestions & guidance on next steps will be much appreciated

Thank you very much.

Paul -