Win 10 Activated No License Key Needed (COA)

[HFultzjr]

I have an Acer laptop with Win 7 HP.
Hard drive was bad, so I did a clean install Win 10 HP on SSD.
Left on overnight and was surprised that windows was activated next morning.
I did not enter the COA key or any other info.
My question is, does Win 7 now activate as Win 8 and 8.1 does with the key stored in the machine.
I've never had a Win 7 activate without any input.
This system had the original OEM install from Acer.
Anybody else seen this happening?

 

[Mick]

I'm confused. Was it W7 or W 10 that activated? Either way, if it's a new disk, it must be activated off the BIOS store as you've intimated.

 

[nlinecomputers]

Windows 10 if it doesn't see the internet will do a 30 day activation sometimes. It will keep trying in the background once you get an internet connection and then suddenly it will deactivate and prompt for a key.

 

[Porthos]

The only way that computer activated is for 2 reasons.
1- Win 10 was on that computer even for a miute back during the free upgrade push and was rolled back.
2- It actually had a WIN 8 bios. Business class machine with the Win 7 downgrade only avaiable with Pro. You said it was home so that does not apply.

 

[HFultzjr]

The only way that computer activated is for 2 reasons.
1- Win 10 was on that computer even for a miute back during the free upgrade push and was rolled back.
2- It actually had a WIN 8 bios. Business class machine with the Win 7 downgrade only avaiable with Pro. You said it was home so that does not apply.

Has me confused as hell.
I'm almost 99.999% positive it never had Win 10.
No left over Win 10 upgrade folders.
Cheapy laptop with Win 7 HP OEM install.
Never had Win 8.
???????????

Windows 10 if it doesn't see the internet will do a 30 day activation sometimes. It will keep trying in the background once you get an internet connection and then suddenly it will deactivate and prompt for a key.

I hope not, but it says activated.

I'm confused. Was it W7 or W 10 that activated? Either way, if it's a new disk, it must be activated off the BIOS store as you've intimated.

Original was Win 7 HP
Activated Win 10 HP with no input (COA) on new SSD, clean install.

 

[sapphirescales]

I have an Acer laptop with Win 7 HP.
Hard drive was bad, so I did a clean install Win 10 HP on SSD.
Left on overnight and was surprised that windows was activated next morning.
I did not enter the COA key or any other info.
My question is, does Win 7 now activate as Win 8 and 8.1 does with the key stored in the machine.
I've never had a Win 7 activate without any input.
This system had the original OEM install from Acer.
Anybody else seen this happening?

I made a thread about this a while back. Windows 10 sometimes just activates. I think it will eventually detect that there's not a proper license and deactivate itself. I recommend installing a Windows 10 key through an elevated command prompt:

slmgr.vbs /ipk #####-#####-#####-#####-#####

 

[Porthos]

I'm almost 99.999% positive it never had Win 10.

All it had to do is go thru the update in the past and reverted and it will activate in the future.

clean install

From an ISO or image?

 

[nlinecomputers]

There were techs at the time that were selling upgrade reservations. The thought was that Microsoft was going to end the offer and it was best to get the update registered even if you didn't want it now. So techs were slamming in new HDD doing a quick Win 10 install and then putting the client's old drive back in and handing the system back. Presto instant free copy of Windows 10 any time you want to claim it.

 

[fencepost]

I was doing those activations on client systems that I figured might still be in use by the Win7 EOL (basically any i3-2xxx or better processor, 4+GB of RAM and Windows 7 Pro). I wasn't even doing an install of Win10 - I had an SSD with Win10 preinstalled, IIRC my sequence was to grab the key from the sticker or OS and write it down, shut down, disconnect the HD and connect the SSD, boot, go to Activation, activate with that key, shut down (fast start obviously disabled), put the drives back, close it up and slap on a sticker that said "Windows 10 Activated using (sticker key|BIOS key)". Just a few minutes per machine.

These days however I'd probably not upgrade most of those machines anyway, because I'd rather put in SSDs and by the time I run through that on an older box it probably makes more sense to just have them get new boxes with SSD and Windows 10 preinstalled, plus a TPM to make it easy to do Bitlocker. I have one client where they wanted all the boxes upgraded to 10 and encrypted, and none of the desktops have TPMs which means they boot to a Bitlocker password prompt even before they get to the domain login.

 

[MichaelBits]

There were techs at the time that were selling upgrade reservations. The thought was that Microsoft was going to end the offer and it was best to get the update registered even if you didn't want it now. So techs were slamming in new HDD doing a quick Win 10 install and then putting the client's old drive back in and handing the system back. Presto instant free copy of Windows 10 any time you want to claim it.

Funny you said that...

I didn't do that for customers, but I did it to almost all of my PC's at home.

 

[Porthos]

So many computers were rolled back in the first weeks of Win 10. Both by techs and the "more savy" end users.
Also depending on the bios date, A Win 8 bios key might of been there as well and still have a Win 7 COA.

 

[fincoder]

I'm almost 99.999% positive it never had Win 10.

Based on what? You can only know that if it's your computer.

Anyway, as others have said, Windows 10 installs (since 1803 I think) show activated initially now, and at some point if you don't enter the key it will deactivate (probably 30 days).

 

[Porthos]

Windows 10 installs (since 1803 I think) show activated initially now, and at some point if you don't enter the key it will deactivate (probably 30 days).

I have not seen that. For me they have activated when entitled or or shown not activated when you go to the activation screen.

 

[fincoder]

I have not seen that.

It might be because I deliberately avoid connecting the computer to the internet until after manually installing the latest cumulative update and drivers with SDIO. Saves lots of download quota every month.

 

[Porthos]

It might be because I deliberately avoid connecting the computer to the internet until after manually installing the latest cumulative update and drivers with SDIO. Saves lots of download quota every month.

Do the same but because I do not want the prompt for a MS account to show at all.

 

[HFultzjr]

I made a thread about this a while back. Windows 10 sometimes just activates. I think it will eventually detect that there's not a proper license and deactivate itself. I recommend installing a Windows 10 key through an elevated command prompt:

slmgr.vbs /ipk #####-#####-#####-#####-#####

Thanks,
I think I'll just activate with a key anyways, just to make sure it doesn't come back.

 

[HFultzjr]

All it had to do is go thru the update in the past and reverted and it will activate in the future.

From an ISO or image?

I'm going to "presume" that at one time it was "activated" with Win 10, as I have no other explanation.
Install was from a media creation tool .iso

 

[nlinecomputers]

Lots of people got hit with the forced/tricked upgrade that M$ was pushing during the first year. Some people managed to roll it back. Once done you have a permanent reservation on file.

 

[Porthos]

Install was from a media creation tool .iso

Did it ask for editionand key during setup?

Down load showkey plus and post the saved log.
https://www.tenforums.com/software-apps/2577-showkeyplus.html

 

[HFultzjr]

Did it ask for editionand key during setup?

Down load showkey plus and post the saved log.
https://www.tenforums.com/software-apps/2577-showkeyplus.html

I picked Win 10 Home from the .iso, as this was what version Win 7 COA it had.
I picked "did not have a key" option.
I also do everything before connecting to the internet.
Always had to activate later with the Win 7 COA.
It's going back to the customer 8 am, so I'm not going to be able to pull any keys.
I was just checking if anyone else has seen this.
I'm chalking it up to must of had Win 10 upgrade and rollback.
No big deal, just curious.
Thanks for your input.