Upgrading Win 7 to Win 10

[Jimjam]

Slightly off topic, but I know many of you are delightfully helpful nerds.... Please help me!

Anyone know of a way to upgrade from win7 to win10 for free without having to reenter your product key?

I formatted win7 and installed win10 but it failed to activate as it didn't recognise the hardware. Unfortunately the product code sticker was illegible.

I managed to use recovery drive to reset to an activated win7 install.

If I use the upgrade tool to go to win 10, instead of a fresh install, will the computer activate properly?

[xaix1999]

TL DR go-to the website and get the upgrade tool, have your product key ready
or use a program to pull your key

i believe the time period for free upgrades is long over
any kind of upgrade from 7 to 10 (in my experience at least) does a dirty install over 7 with 10
leaving all the old 7 files and registry
i very quickly ran into issues with my old windows 7 files still being available

almost anything you want to do will want to verify your product key
just to verify you have home and not pro, so you don't upgrade to pro

for safety, 7 isn't getting updates and is riddled with bugs and exploits
10 isn't much better but it's getting updates
10 also will make your microphone on and records everything around you
10 also will make your camera on and records everything around you
they send both to Microsoft
good luck turning anything off as every updated will reset most things to back on
if you modify your host files, windows says it's infected and deletes it
if you modify your host files, and add windows adware telemetry to the sites blocked your pc blue screens

with all that said please install Linux and save your computer from being tortured
windows will torture your hdd and ssd

[mcoy]

These steps still work. Back up anything you care about first.

https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/14/21065140/how-to-upgrade-microsoft-windows-7-10-free-os

-Mcoy

[Jimjam]

First up thanks for the support guys, I’m glad to see I’m not the only one to have navigated these struggles!

Okay, I used a recovery image to go back to a (hp bloatware loaded) windows 7 install that was already activated. I upgraded this to a win10 install using the tool, which is this time active. Hurrah!

The computer is now added to my microsoft account as an activated install. I’m very happy with this as the assistant on the phone told me i would need proof of purchase from 9 years ago or buy a new key.


To get rid of the bloatware would I now be able to format the partition and reinstall win10 and the machine would now be recognised as the same machine for activation purposes?

I really don’t be needing wildfire games or magic desktop! It will be a shame to lose movie maker though!

As it stands the computer is just running on a HDD, no SSD being tortured yet. Could switching to a SDD mess up my activation? Are there steps to take against that happening?

[xaix1999]

as far as i know from dealing with windows, you will still need to activate
check your account on the Microsoft website for product key or activation codes as
just logging back into your account doesn't work every time as you are hoping
adding an ssd won't change anything unless you are using secure boot from another device
even doing a 1:1 copy to another device can't help that the unique device id has changed
but over all an ssd will help your windows experience just in general

[xaix1999]

as always test in a virtual machine before formatting
save yourself with a Linux install
my install has grown over the years to about 16gb
windows 10 needs at least 64gb ( i think the minimum is 40gb )