- Oct 5, 2002
- 509
- 21
- 18,985
Ok, this is a bit of a convoluted mess, and I am not sure what I am even supposed to do, it involves three computers.
Computer 1: This is a 3770K system I built in 2012. I installed Windows 7 Pro on it, and eventually upgraded that to Windows 10 Pro.
Computer 2: This is a 3rd gen (Or was it 2nd gen?) i7 Laptop, it came with Windows 8 Home, but I hated 8 so much I went and got another copy of 7 Pro, wiped it's drive, and installed that. I also eventually upgraded this to 10.
Computer 3: This is a 11700K system I built recently, currently does not have a key, I am on a temporary Windows 10 install for now.
I am pretty sure I used a local account on both 1 and 2, MAYBE Computer 2 had an online account.
Anyway, computer 1 has been giving me problems lately, taking multiple attempts to actually turn on. It has a lot of data and configurations that I do not want to start over on however, so I am planning to clone the install to Computer 3.
Computer 2 is dead, completely. As in physically fried, didn't see the smoke but I definitely smelled it. That thing is not going to be working again.
Since I still want to see if I can fix up Computer 1 as a backup, I don't want to de-activate or transfer my license from it. Since Computer 2 is fried however and since I used a retail key on it and not the original OEM key it came with, I want to try to use it's key on the 11700K system.
Since Computer 2's HDD is perfectly fine even though the motherboard is fried, I temporarily placed it in the 3770K system to try to extract it's key.
I tried looking up ways to find it's key, but almost all failed. Eventually I looked up a site that told me three different ways to get a key. One was with the wmic command in the command prompt... which did not work, the other was a PowerShell command... that also did not work. But it also told me to look in a location in my registry and I got what APPEARS to be the key there, however, when I swapped Computer 1's original HDD back in, the SAME key appeared. I don't know if somehow Windows replaced Computer 2's key with Computer 1's key when I connected it online (I accidently ran Windows Update on it, which updated to 22H2 when it was several versions behind previously, dunno if that did it).
I also have no idea how to properly go about this and how to properly transfer it to the cloned OS. First of all, if I boot up the cloned OS on Computer 3, will it de-activate the install on Computer 1 if I take them both online? If not and Computer 3 just simply won't auto-activate, do I need to de-activate the key on the Computer 2 drive first? Problem with that is that the HDD from Computer 2 is in Computer 1 since the original system it was from is fried, if I de-activate the key on Computer 2's HDD while it's in Computer 1 will it actually flag the hardware in Computer 1 as de-activated and then it's original Windows 10 install on it's SSD once I re-connect it will no longer be activated? Can I just try to activate the extracted key from the registry (assuming it's correct, but I am worried it will de-activate Computer 1 instead) on Computer 3 and not bother worry about de-activating it on Computer 2's HDD first?
And also, it will be a while until I can fully re-configure the cloned install from Computer 1 to Computer 3 so as I said, I have a temporary install on Computer 3 for now. Can I activate the key on said temporary install and still have it work when I wipe it and copy over the cloned install from Computer 1? I know that Windows assigns some type of hardware ID to the key so as long as too much of the original hardware does not change it can re-activate the system, but I have no idea if that can get mixed up if you then connect an OS that has a different key assigned to it to a system that was already activated with a different key, both of them being retail keys and not OEM.
If there is nothing I can do myself to recover that key, would Microsoft somehow be able to determine what key I had on Computer 2 and see that it has not been used in years so I can re-use it on Computer 3? It is a retail key that I purchased (I think it was even directly from them) and upgraded to Windows 10 years ago after all, I should still own it right? Can't really afford to buy another Windows key so I really need to recover that one.
Computer 1: This is a 3770K system I built in 2012. I installed Windows 7 Pro on it, and eventually upgraded that to Windows 10 Pro.
Computer 2: This is a 3rd gen (Or was it 2nd gen?) i7 Laptop, it came with Windows 8 Home, but I hated 8 so much I went and got another copy of 7 Pro, wiped it's drive, and installed that. I also eventually upgraded this to 10.
Computer 3: This is a 11700K system I built recently, currently does not have a key, I am on a temporary Windows 10 install for now.
I am pretty sure I used a local account on both 1 and 2, MAYBE Computer 2 had an online account.
Anyway, computer 1 has been giving me problems lately, taking multiple attempts to actually turn on. It has a lot of data and configurations that I do not want to start over on however, so I am planning to clone the install to Computer 3.
Computer 2 is dead, completely. As in physically fried, didn't see the smoke but I definitely smelled it. That thing is not going to be working again.
Since I still want to see if I can fix up Computer 1 as a backup, I don't want to de-activate or transfer my license from it. Since Computer 2 is fried however and since I used a retail key on it and not the original OEM key it came with, I want to try to use it's key on the 11700K system.
Since Computer 2's HDD is perfectly fine even though the motherboard is fried, I temporarily placed it in the 3770K system to try to extract it's key.
I tried looking up ways to find it's key, but almost all failed. Eventually I looked up a site that told me three different ways to get a key. One was with the wmic command in the command prompt... which did not work, the other was a PowerShell command... that also did not work. But it also told me to look in a location in my registry and I got what APPEARS to be the key there, however, when I swapped Computer 1's original HDD back in, the SAME key appeared. I don't know if somehow Windows replaced Computer 2's key with Computer 1's key when I connected it online (I accidently ran Windows Update on it, which updated to 22H2 when it was several versions behind previously, dunno if that did it).
I also have no idea how to properly go about this and how to properly transfer it to the cloned OS. First of all, if I boot up the cloned OS on Computer 3, will it de-activate the install on Computer 1 if I take them both online? If not and Computer 3 just simply won't auto-activate, do I need to de-activate the key on the Computer 2 drive first? Problem with that is that the HDD from Computer 2 is in Computer 1 since the original system it was from is fried, if I de-activate the key on Computer 2's HDD while it's in Computer 1 will it actually flag the hardware in Computer 1 as de-activated and then it's original Windows 10 install on it's SSD once I re-connect it will no longer be activated? Can I just try to activate the extracted key from the registry (assuming it's correct, but I am worried it will de-activate Computer 1 instead) on Computer 3 and not bother worry about de-activating it on Computer 2's HDD first?
And also, it will be a while until I can fully re-configure the cloned install from Computer 1 to Computer 3 so as I said, I have a temporary install on Computer 3 for now. Can I activate the key on said temporary install and still have it work when I wipe it and copy over the cloned install from Computer 1? I know that Windows assigns some type of hardware ID to the key so as long as too much of the original hardware does not change it can re-activate the system, but I have no idea if that can get mixed up if you then connect an OS that has a different key assigned to it to a system that was already activated with a different key, both of them being retail keys and not OEM.
If there is nothing I can do myself to recover that key, would Microsoft somehow be able to determine what key I had on Computer 2 and see that it has not been used in years so I can re-use it on Computer 3? It is a retail key that I purchased (I think it was even directly from them) and upgraded to Windows 10 years ago after all, I should still own it right? Can't really afford to buy another Windows key so I really need to recover that one.
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