269 replies to this topic 2 votes

[Shane Nokes]

sathenzar, on 05 November 2012 - 03:54, said:

You know I've often wondered about the last part of what you said. I have always wondered how the disc knew if you had an eligible OS upgrade after you wiped it / rebooted then re-installed windows. Isn't the hard drive empty at that point? Or does it store a tiny bit of info after it formats the drive? Just the programmers curiosity coming out on that one

It stores that data in RAM if I remember correctly.

[sathenzar]

so technically if you wiped the drive and turned off the computer it wouldn't remember the information. Lets hope we don't get a power outage while upgrading with a clean install But thanks for the heads up. That question has been quietly nagging at me for years I've just been too lazy to look it up.

[Shane Nokes]

sathenzar, on 07 November 2012 - 03:59, said:

so technically if you wiped the drive and turned off the computer it wouldn't remember the information. Lets hope we don't get a power outage while upgrading with a clean install But thanks for the heads up. That question has been quietly nagging at me for years I've just been too lazy to look it up.

Exactly. That's how it is supposed to work. I've never tested that scenario. However I do believe if you've wiped the drive, but started the install process that's one of the first piece of info that gets committed to the drive. So it should still allow you to complete the install as long as it had started.

[kevpan815]

I just tried out what Shane has been saying here and turns out he was correct after all. My apologies.

[Shane Nokes]

No problem Kevin. I do get things wrong sometimes. This was just a case where I have very close working knowledge of how things work.

Sometimes that's not the case, so thank you for conceding that graciously.

[carmatic]

okay so... i am not elligible for the upgrade if i use a new hard disk drive and i have to purchase the OEM copy ...?

[stockwiz]

from personal experience the upgrade product keys will work on anything, they don't check if you already have anything installed or not, and they let you clean install. It might not be morally right for some to not pay full price, but charging 40 bucks is the only way you'll get some people to pay for windows at all, so it's an effective strategy in it's own right. Just buy the upgrade and be happy. If you want to be really evil, you can tell them you bought a netbook after June 2012 and get it for 15 bucks. I did that with one of the three product keys I purchased. I had a netbook with product key ready though when I found out I didn't need a product key.. I was just going to lie on the date I purchased said netbook.

[Slasheight]

Ive not read this whole topic(Don't have time its huge) but I have now for the third time activated windows 8 pro with a upgrade key by installing it in a hard drive with a NONE activated copy of windows on it. I formatted the drive in the setup and windows was activated immediately after installation.

Easy.

I am eligible for the upgrade anyway so don't see a problem.

[Shane Nokes]

Slasheight, on 25 November 2012 - 18:46, said:

Ive not read this whole topic(Don't have time its huge) but I have now for the third time activated windows 8 pro with a upgrade key by installing it in a hard drive with a NONE activated copy of windows on it. I formatted the drive in the setup and windows was activated immediately after installation.

Easy.

I am eligible for the upgrade anyway so don't see a problem.

Too bad you didn't read the thread. You would have found multiple posts where I pointed out that what you did is normal and has pretty much always worked.

[Slasheight]

Sorry just thought Id help anyone out if it hadn't been noted. I did however on one install get a message saying this key is not for clean installations. Had to format and install again. Think it was because I didn't enter the correct key in the setup but rather I used one I got off the internet so I could verify windows 8 ran ok on the said computer first. Loving windows 8 now Ive got used to it.

[Frank Cervantes]

If you downloaded the Windows 8 upgrade version from the Microsoft store, you are required to have a XP through Win7. Otherwise, you will NOT be allowed to activate. I know this for a fact because I have tried it and the last error message I received after installing to a brand new hard drive went something along the lines of "this activation code is not valid for a clean intall"

[Frank Cervantes]

carmatic, on 18 November 2012 - 14:14, said:

okay so... i am not elligible for the upgrade if i use a new hard disk drive and i have to purchase the OEM copy ...?

If you have your previous OS disks do a minimal install and don't even activate it. Then you can install Windows 8 upgrade without a problem. The upgrade activation code given with the upgrade does not allow for a clean install and does not ask for the disk of the previous eligible OS... go figure.

[Shane Nokes]

Frank Cervantes, on 28 November 2012 - 15:33, said:

If you have your previous OS disks do a minimal install and don't even activate it. Then you can install Windows 8 upgrade without a problem. The upgrade activation code given with the upgrade does not allow for a clean install and does not ask for the disk of the previous eligible OS... go figure.

Actually it does allow for a clean install. You can boot the machine (as long as there is a prior valid OS) and then using the disc completely wipe the drive and install 8, and it will activate just fine.

What you can't do is have a completely new system without anything on it and install the upgrade and have it activate.

I've went over this several times in prior posts. I would say at least 20-30 times now...minimum.

[+nesl247]

I'm not going to read through 17 pages here, but doing a clean install with the upgrade disc is entirely possible, in fact I've already done it 3 times. I originally bought the upgrades and did in place upgrades, but decided to do a fresh install. What you have to do is to install Windows fresh like you normally would. When Windows boots up after the install, it will be unactivated and won't be able to activate. You need to use regedit to browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup\OOBE
and change MediaBootInstall to 0.

[Shane Nokes]

nesl247, on 28 November 2012 - 15:48, said:

I'm not going to read through 17 pages here, but doing a clean install with the upgrade disc is entirely possible, in fact I've already done it 3 times. I originally bought the upgrades and did in place upgrades, but decided to do a fresh install. What you have to do is to install Windows fresh like you normally would. When Windows boots up after the install, it will be unactivated and won't be able to activate. You need to use regedit to browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup\OOBE
and change MediaBootInstall to 0.

Been discussed, and that's a workaround that involves violating the End User License Agreement.

If you don't have a valid license that you have used to upgrade from then essentially you're committing fraud in order to get a good price.