Only changing the motherboard should make the key not work.
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He's not changing hardware, he wants to use one disc to install on another comp, then use a NEW key, which can (sometimes) work. Too bad in his case it's a Pro key and a Home disc, so there's no chance it'll work.
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If you have a valid Windows 7 key, you can download the ISO direct from MS - https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/software-download/home
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Thanks for the link. Despite googling for ages, I didn't come across that link for some reason.
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I know that feel, it depresses me that I could torrent it so quickly if I needed to, but to obtain it legally is such a difficult search. I remember it taking me ages to find the legal download link.
I could be wrong but I "think" if you use a disk from another computer it brings along the same key (so likely illegal as you're using a key over multiple computers where you've only been allowed one license, also I think it does a harddrive test to see if its the same size maybe other details to ensure its the same computer and stops installation if the checks arn't corrent. Not sure if this is still true due to UEFI and stuff? I unno)
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Short answer: No.
Long answer: You can bypass and use this same OEM license on a different computer but following MS rules, this would be considered illegal.
TL;DR: Join to the Tux side, Linux is love.
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Thanks for the response. As for Linux... No! Never!
Although your mascot is quite adorable
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If the key is new, just download the correct ISO from MancSoulja's link and install Windows from that.
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Your best bet is to download the actual ISO from Microsoft, or another trusted site (there are many sites that hosts the ISO's of Windows OS's). OEM Discs will often not activate with retail keys (but this isn't always true, depends on the disc).
https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/software-download/windows7 should work.
Also Home and Pro are different discs/iso's, you must use the correct version, or have one that allows you to install any version. So it will conflict for sure there.
As for x64 and x86, the product key works on both. So that's a non-issue.
In short, your best bet is to get the Pro ISO and and do it that way.
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Thank you for the incredibly useful answer.
I only really have on concern left, and am wondering if you could shed some light on it.
I'm not sure how to actually go about doing this.
Should I download Windows onto an external harddrive now, and then use that harddrive to install windows onto the new computer?
The thing is, if I insert my product key on the site in order to download windows, won't it then invalidate my product key for when I try to activate windows on the new PC?
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Re: Product Key, no. MS it just checking to make sure it's valid, it doesn't deactivate it :) Even if you've installed it before it would still come up as valid. OEM keys and the like however will NOT come up as Valid, and MS will tell you to contact your manufacture to get a copy (who normally charge for it). But Retail keys are always valid there.
As for how to install, you have two options. One is to burn the ISO to a DVD, and use that to install. The other is to "burn" it to a USB Thumb Drive. There are several tools for this, I use Rufus. Then you just boot from the DVD/USB, install, and you're golden :)
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OK, thank you so much for answering everything I asked in such a clear manner.
Sadly I don't have a 4GB USB Thumb Drive, so I can't actually go about it that way. I believe using an empty external harddrive in the exact same method should do the trick. Hopefully?
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It's hit and miss that way. I've seen some Motherboards refuse to boot off a USB HDD, but will off a Thumbdrive.
Also, 4GB, never count on that, most of my Windows ISO's are JUST over 4GB The only ones I have that actually work on a 4GB stick are the 32bit ones, that said I have no idea how big the one you get from the MS site will be.
Thumbdrives are cheap, I'd grab an 8GB one, use it for this then you'll have one should you ever need it in the future for 10 or just normal usage.
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I was thinking the same about buying a cheap Thumbdrive, but I really don't want to be spending any extra money at the moment. Perhaps if it's cheap enough, haha. And I'm slightly stressed on time, because my current harddrive is slowly dying, so I need to get my new PC as soon as possible, as my Youtube channel relies on it.
I'll go out to the store tomorrow and see if I find a USB big and cheap enough, and if not I'll try out the External harddrive.
Again, thank you very much for the helpful responses. Welcome to my whitelist :)
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Any old thumbdrive will do, so it should be really cheap. I got a stack of them for a few $ a while back that I use.
You don't need USB3 or anything. Mind you that makes it a bit faster, but even USB2 is more than fast (WAY faster than a DVD). Shouldn't be hard to find some cheap USB2 Thumbdrive. Hell most of the ones I use now are 16GB cause they often go on sale dirt cheap.
Also, thanks :)
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Haha, here in Cyprus technology is overpriced, so I may not be as lucky. Windows 7 was 150 EUR here, hence why I purchased the digital version online for 15 EUR instead :)
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Well I just tried entering my product key into Microsoft's site and it says
"The product key you've entered appears to be for software which was pre-installed by the device manufacturer. Please contact the device manufacturer for software recovery options.".
I'm assuming that's because I bought an OEM key. Well I can easily download the official iso from somewhere else, but will this product key still activate fine? As long as I download the right version of W7? Which in my case is Pro.
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Yes, it will work fine. I've done it before without issue :)
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And the iso I download can be a retail copy of windows 7? No need for an iso of the OEM disk?
Turns out all the Digitalriver and W7forums Iso download links are down. Having trouble finding legitimate ISOs now
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Yes, the ISOs are the same. Those links have been down for quite some time, try a torrent, just be sure to check the hash values and it will be fine.
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I'm a bit wary about downloading from torrents, especially because I don't even know what to look for. You mentioned hash values, I have no idea what that is :)
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Looks like you got it covered, but for future reference you'll often see right beside downloads, a grouping of numbers and letters, thats a MD5 hash, if what you download matches that, regardless of where it's from, then it's the same. Obviously getting from the source is generally best, but this way at least you know nothing funky was done with the disc :)
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Ah interesting. Thanks for the info once again. Well hopefully this'll work.
I've only just had the realization that I could have possibly avoided a lot of headache this whole time.
Windows 10 has been popping up for the past few months saying "HEY, GET AN UPGRADE!". I believe the install files are already downloaded on my system. I wonder if I could just put those on the external hard drive, and then install that onto my new empty hard drive, to avoid all of this windows 7 iso nonsense. I might have even saved myself some money from not buying those product keys.
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Windows 10 has been popping up for the past few months saying "HEY, GET AN UPGRADE!". I believe the install files are already downloaded on my system. I wonder if I could just put those on the external hard drive, and then install that onto my new empty hard drive, to avoid all of this windows 7 iso nonsense.
That wouldn't be possible... also, I'd never recommend 10, especially via upgrade. If you need to do a clean install after the free period, that's that.
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Yea, I just went with Windows 7, and will possibly upgrade it a bit down the line.
Thanks for all the help by the way!
Might I ask why you wouldn't recommend W10? I hear so many mixed opinions.
Some say it improves performance by a lot and is basically the same as W7 but better, as long as you disable the privacy invasive stuff, and some others say the performance is bad and not worth it.
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They are indeed similar when it comes to performance. The main reason I disliked it was pushing updates (and that "free year" scheme).
I also prefer disabling all useless eye-candy, so mine looks like Win 95, but perhaps that's also possible on 10.
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Oh ok, well thank you very much for your input throughout the whole thread. Hopefully this will all go fine :)
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Those don't work for me because I have an OEM product key
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No worries. As for just downloading windows 10, I absolutely would have, but can I do that?
I was under the impression that getting a free copy of windows 10 required a working copy of W7, which I wouldn't have on an empty, brand new hard drive. Unless I'm not understanding this correctly.
Is it possible to download windows 10 onto my external hard drive, and then use that to install it onto a brand new hard drive?
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No.
What you need to do is install 7, then if you want to go to 10, update to 10.
You don't just get given a key that you can use anywhere, it's a free Update to 10, not a free Copy of 10 :)
That said.. there are several activation cracks out there that work on 7, that'll let you upgrade to a copy of 10 that as far as MS is concerned is legit :)
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Well I didn't expect the site to just give me a free copy, as you said. I was just wondering if my current WIndows 7 product key would allow me to download Windows 10, considering we're still in the free update period, but I guess I'm out of luck there. If that won't work, then the easiest method is probably to just go about what I was doing before. W7 Iso, and my good ol' OEM product key :)
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The need for vendor-specific OEM discs has been gone since the XP days. Vista, 7, 8, and 10 will activate OEM keys on retail media (and will even check the BIOS for embedded keys).
Sadly the official Windows 7 download tool only works with retail keys I think (Windows 8 you can download without a license at all, weirdly enough), but it's easy to find mirrors of the official ISO from MSDN. Just Google "digitalriver mirror" to find the "(un)-official DigitalRiver Mirror" which has any Windows 7 ISO you'd ever need.
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I found exactly that right before your post. Thank you very much anyway :)
I was scared of grabbing some illegal and malware-infested copy, but I'm happy someone mirrored the legit ISOs, so I may be at peace, haha.
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For the record, OEM media has special activation checks slipstreamed into the install media that look at the system BIOS for special keys unique to the OEM - i.e. a HP disc will look in the BIOS for HP's specific activation keys. If its present, the software activates when the OS is installed and it tries to phone home.
If the key isn't present in the BIOS or it's incorrect (i.e. you use a HP disc on a Dell PC), the software won't activate and the OOBE will ask for a genuine OEM key (often present on the case if its a genuine OEM PC from the correct manufacturer) or give you a link to buy one from MS.
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He's referring to Win 7, it doesn't check hardware or BIOS.
@OP You can install from any ISO, but you will most likely need to reactivate every time you change a piece of hardware. I don't know how that would work in your country, here in Brazil I need to activate by phone whenever I do a clean install and/or replace anything (mostly graphics cards and processors, and ofc motherboards -- hard drives and memory don't seem to trigger reactivation so often). It's a pain, but only takes about 5 minutes. All my keys are OEM.
About the ISO, there is a way to modify any of them so you can install a different version of Windows, but I'd advise you to obtain a MSDN Win 7 Pro ISO with SP1 (so you don't need to install it later, it's very time-consuming). Microsoft won't provide them directly (unless you happen to have a paid subscription), but they do inform their MD5 values, so you can download a copy with a torrent client and check them afterwards. It's possible to install the ISO to a portable USB HDD > http://blogs.technet.com/b/danstolts/archive/2012/07/26/create-bootable-usb-thumb-drive-key-using-diskpart-with-windows-8-media-to-install-windows-8-release-preview-or-other-operating-system.aspx
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Well someone provided a link to download Windows 7, so I'm assuming I just need to download the Professional version specifically and it should work fine, wouldn't it?
Also, I'm assuming considering I bought a product key, and will activate windows that way using internet, I probably wouldn't need to call Microsoft. Unless I'm understanding something wrong.
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Yes, it should.
Since Windows Vista, I only succeeded in activating online once (and it wasn't an OEM key)... maybe it's different in Cyprus, but I'm willing to bet it will ask you to contact Microsoft when you try to activate.
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even if it requires you to call MS there is no conversation and not possible for it to deny you if you answer 0 or 1 to "how many computers is this copy of windows installed on" unless the key has been heavily abused.. and odds of you needing to even do that are fairly low unless that product code was used within the last 6months (i belive, or sometime recently anyways), or unless the activation servers are on a fritz.
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Ah thanks for the info. Well this is a brand new product key (Or so I'm told by the store), so this should hopefully activate fine. I'd rather not have to call Microsoft for activation, even if it's automated, as we don't have any sort of Microsoft branch here. I'd probably need to call internationally.
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thats not at all his question, though im sure his end intent is to upgrade that windows 7 license to a windows 10 license, for him to do so legally within the free time period he will need to upgrade it from the installed windows 7 license he intends on upgrading..
@mrwoodensheep but yes just download a matching iso basically.. retail would make it easier on you but even most oem versions should work assuming it matchs pro/home and the product code matches revision or service pack capabilities.. though i believe in win7 pro iso retail should work regardless of SP versions.
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Oh, I hadn't heard that service pack thing. I hope you're right about it not having to match SP versions, as I didn't take that into account. Also, I only had one option, so let's just hope it's alright.
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Rather then buy Windows 7 you're better off using Dazloader or a similar activator. I've been doing that for years for people (100+ computers) I let them know before hand and everyone has been fine with it, it is undetectable as the activator (if it's any good) runs before windows so windows can't do a thing about it, you're still able to verify it doesn't add any unwanted files/executable(s) with malware-anti-bytes.
There's no need to pay for windows especially if you plan on using a windows 7, 8, or 8.1 key to get windows 10 and using a activator then upgrading to windows 10 gives you a legit 100% legal key.
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Yea, I was tempted to but I figured for 15 EUR, might as well go the legit route. Although it proved to be a bit of a hassle. Hopefully my key works fine. Thanks for your input though! Interesting to know that you then get a legit W10 key :)
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Yup no problem. Some people complained about getting their windows 10 key revoked but I've never seen it happen in person or have had it happen to any of the people I've done it for. It's pretty nice getting a free Win 10 key for the highest tier package (home, premium, etc)
I would warn you that Windows 10 currently has a lot of spyware built into it (you tracks pretty much 100% of what you do) but it's possible to remove all if not most of it through youtube video guides and such. I even think someone built a program to do most of it for you, I know Logan from The Tek (youtube channel search it) did a short video on how to stop some of the spying.
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I've heard a lot about that. It's one of the only things that has deterred me a bit from upgrading, although a lot of people say once you get rid of that stuff, the OS is quite good.
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Exactly; here is the actual YouTube video I was referencing.
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Also I wanted to add (but didn't know if you already checked your messages) I use Windows 10 as my main operating system and it's very good, I got a considerable fps increase in my games and I generally think it's a massive (UI) improvement over 8.1.
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Thanks for the input. I'm moving from 7 to 10, so not sure if it's better. I took a quick look and am not a huge fan of the interface. Looks too much like a phone
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8 and 8.1 are built for tablets and windows 10 takes some of those metro elements for the new start menu, doesn't really look like a phone at all imo.
You'll get a lot more performance out of 10 since it exclusively has DX12, I saw a 4 to 10 fps gain in my games since I switched from 8.1. It is worth it and you'll have to get used to the new interface but hey it's just like the people that upgraded from win 98 to XP or XP to 7.
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Yea, except when I upgraded from 98 to XP to 7, I liked the new interfaces. I understood why they looked the way they did, and they looked cool and modern.
I've only watched about 2 videos on W10, so perhaps those people had some strange layout choice on it, and the privacy issues are annoying. I was really surprised just to see how invasive it really was. I'm still going to look into it more though.
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Well you'll be happy to know they're patching in ways to disable the invasive-ness of windows 10 but that's not coming for another couple months. After that it should actually be a good OS.
Really when you're getting something for free though you're the product so I totally understand why Microsoft has done what they have done. They want to be like Google in the sense that Google is a information giant, you don't even want to know what google has on you I mean like my google profile goes back to when I was 12... think about the weird google searches that have went on in those 10+ years.
I actually believe that the new start menu interface is a combination of metro and widgets (remember those things that no one used in vista/7?) The things you can do with it are neat, at least kinda.
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Those inexpensive keys labelled "OEM" sold everywhere are from MSDN accounts (Pay a fee, get access to a big library of Microsoft software with keys for developer/testing purposes. Resellers sell the keys individually and profit). They may or may not get deactivated at a later date as their distribution/sale violates the MSDN terms. Although you're paying for it and it activates, it's not legit in the sense that if you had to contact Microsoft for support then they would consider the license counterfeit.
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Oh okay, that's good to know. Thanks! Hopefully I don't run into any problems
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So people always say I can't reuse a Windows 7 OEM copy on a 2nd computer. Does "copy" mean it won't let me install Windows at all? Or just not activate the same product key?
I've purchased a digital product key from a store so that I may activate windows 7 on my new PC when I build it next week, but I was trying to figure out where I can actually download Windows from. I have an old OEM disk lying around. Would it be possible to install Windows 7 through that disk onto my new harddrive, and then activate it with my brand new product key?
In case it matters, this OEM disk is for a Home Premium version of W7. My product key is for the Profesional version. I'm assuming it won't conflict?
I don't have much experience with this, so I'm assuming that considering my disc is the 64 bit of Windows 7 Home Premium, it'll install as 64 bit despite my code? The code didn't specify what bit it was on the website.
Thanks for your time!
Quite low on money at the moment, so here's a Giveaway I'm currently running :)
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