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Hello my parents updated their laptop with Windows 7 to Windows 10, apparently by mistake. Since they do it themselves, I did not see the terms of conditions nor any information displayed before the upgrade. Since then they get used to the new appearance of windows so I did not do the rollback to windows 7 for them.

Now I start wondering if in the future I will do the disk format and fresh install of windows (which I usually do for them every 3 - 4 years), how will I be able to activate their copy of Windows 10 after fresh installation? Will I be able to use their Win7 key?

Please note that my parents do not have the hotmail account, and I don't want to force them to make one.

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    You don't have to use a key, and you only have one key anyways, the Windows 7 key. How this all works by the way is well documented
    – Ramhound
    May 11, 2016 at 11:41
  • @Ramhound The initial upgrade doesn't require a key as it finds it on your pc, but a fresh install would require a key as wiping the machine would also wipe the previous key.
    – Ryan
    May 11, 2016 at 11:43
  • @RyanIG You are 100% incorrect. Windows 10 will automatically upgrade because of its hardware based digital entitlement license. Go read just a fraction of my Windows 10 answers, all backed up, by Microsoft links on this subject
    – Ramhound
    May 11, 2016 at 11:44
  • I went through @Ramhound's history to find the answer he is talking about. I think this answer is the one he is referencing (I could be wrong though) superuser.com/questions/1010615/…
    – Burgi
    May 11, 2016 at 11:54
  • @Ramhound Have removed my answer, had not seen anything regarding Digital entitlement and windows 10 before interesting read though will need to look into it more, i was going off what i have read on forums
    – Ryan
    May 11, 2016 at 11:58

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This has been mentioned on this site at least a 100 times.
Windows 10 has uploaded its key to a Microsoft database, together with some hardware identification.
You re-install Windows 10 WITHOUT a key.
1st time the system connects to the internet again it will check with the Microsoft database which will return the key matching the hardware identification for this system.

This does mean that you will loose the Windows 10 license if you change to much hardware (motherboard replacement). Changing just one component (HD, CPU, video-card) should be OK.

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  • Thank you @Tonny I saw other posts but they do not mention is this connected with the server via hotmail account. Since most users have such account it could be implicit. If it is only based on the hardware specifications, thats great. Changing motherboard in Windows 7 cause you licence become invalid anyway, so I presumed that it is the same story with any newer version.
    – Pawel
    May 11, 2016 at 12:23
  • No key is uploaded; what is generated isn't a Windows 10 license key. This hardware activation has no connection to your Hotmail/Microsoft account; Please improve this answer, there are since factual inaccuracies currently
    – Ramhound
    May 11, 2016 at 12:34
  • @Ramhound You are right, but I didn't want to complicate the answer too much. For all intents and purposes, to the average user the result is the same and the exact technical details aren't that important.
    – Tonny
    May 11, 2016 at 15:10
  • Except what you have said, is not, factually correct?
    – Ramhound
    May 11, 2016 at 15:12

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