Windows 10: Windows 10 Home won't activate after motherboard and cpu change, please help!

I'm a highschool student who scraped enough money to buy a second hand Dell Optiplex 790 with a 2nd Gen i5 cpu and a bonus RX 480 included along with an installed retail copy of Windows 10 Home for $200 from a local online marketplace to serve as a workstation/gaming pc. Please note that I was not given a product key and just found out myself through tinkering around with Windows that the Optiplex is installed with a retail copy, and unfortunately I can't contact the dude who sold me the pc anymore.


Some time passed down the line and I found out that my cpu was overheating to the point of my peripherals mouse, keyboard, and monitor would just not work and just wasn't up to task for the workload I put through it so I bought a new motherboard an ASUS Q8&M-E with an i5-4750 cpu as an upgrade. Nothing else was changed aside the motherboard and cpu.


Before changing out the parts i've researched and prepped myself and the hardware so the transition would go as smooth as possible.

My Microsoft account was linked with the digital license and I was about to re-activate Windows, in yellow text it showed me "Windows reported that the hardware of your device has changed. Error code: 0xC004F211" and I did the whole troubleshoot proccess and clicked the "I changed my hardware recently" link. It brought me to the window where it asks me to check mark the device I was using and then clicked 'Activate' only for it to quickly say "Unable to activate Windows. We can't reactivate Windows on this device. Try again later." To which I did and would give me the same message.


I really don't have enough money to spare for a new license and as tempting the cheap $12 keys are i'd much prefer it to not to risk my $12 on some shady ebay code.

Help would be very appreciated and thank you for your time.

:)

 

Activating Windows 10 after motherboard change, tried all methods

Hi

I changed my motherboard and graphics card this afternoon, now windows won;t activate. Tried troubleshooter etc. No luck and I'm signed into my Microsoft account.

Using the latest version of Windows 10

Please help.

 

Windows 10: Fitting a new motherboard and CPU

Hi,

Yes, you may change your Motherboard and CPU without a problem. To resolve your issue in case you encounter a problem, we suggest that you follow the steps in this

article which you can expand Activating Windows 10 after a hardware configuration change
and you can use an Activation troubleshooter if you get activation errors. The given link is previously provided by
'Mike P.

Let us know if you need further assistance.

 

Unable to activate Windows after motherboard, CPU and graphic card change

My old motherboard died after a BIOS update. I had to get a new motherboard and CPU.

At the same time, I got a new graphic card.

after setting everything up, Windows 10 asked me to activate windows.

I tried the Windows activate troubleshoot after hardware change, and saw a list of the computers I have. I select the one that was running the current Windows, but it gave me an error message saying

"We can’t reactivate Windows on this device. Try again later."

Please help.

Pin