Windows 7 - Activation Trial Period - Extend Up to 120 Days

**Brink**

How to Extend the Windows 7 Activation Trial Period Up to 120 Days

Information

This will show you how to extend the Windows 7 activation trial (grace) period 30 days at a time for a total of up to 120 days before you must activate or reinstall Windows 7.

Note

When you install Windows 7, you will have 30 days (trial period) to activate by default. Microsoft has allowed this rearm option to extend this grace period for another 30 days for up to 3 times.

3 (rearms) x 30 (days) = 90 (days extended) + 30 (default days) = 120 days total grace period.

Warning

It is recommended to wait until you only have only 1 day to activate left before doing this to make the most out of the 3 times you have to use this rearm option.

With or without a product key, all pre-release versions of Windows 7, but not earlier than the 6801 build, can only be used up until August 1, 2009. At this point the time bomb will activate and the prerelease of Windows 7 will stop working as per the End User License Agreement with Microsoft: “This software will stop running on August 1, 2009. You may not receive any other notice. You may not be able to access data used with the software when it stops running.”.

EXAMPLE: Days to Activate Trial Period
NOTE: The left screenshot shows 1 day to activate. The right screenshot is after this tutorial been done to reset this back to 30 days to activate. You can see this screen by right clicking on Computer (in Start Menu) and click on Properties.

Tip

To See How Many Rearms You Have Left:
NOTE: You can only do the tutorial below to rearm 3 times. If you have 0 remaining rearms left, then you must either activate Windows 7 or do a clean reinstall to start over and have 3 more rearms.

1. Open the Start Menu.

2. In the search line, type slmgr.vbs -dlv and press enter. (See screenshot below)

3. After a few seconds, you will see this screenshot with how many remaining rearms you have left. (See screenshot below)

Here's How:

1. Open the Start Menu.

2. In the Start Menu search box, type regedit, and press Enter. (See screenshot below)

3. In the registry, go to: (See screenshot below)
Code:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SoftwareProtectionPlatform
4. In the right pane, see if SkipRearm is set to 0 (number 0) . (See screenshot above)
A) If it is not set to 0 - Right click on SkipRearm and click on Modify. Type 0 and click on OK. (See screenshot below)

B) If it is set to 0 - Skip this and go to step 5.

5. Close regedit.

6. Open a elevated command prompt.

7. In the elevated command prompt, type slmgr -rearm and press Enter. (See screenshot below)

8. Click on OK. (See screenshot below)

Warning

If you get one of these errors below, then do what is above the error:
You will need to restart the computer first, then repeat steps 6 to 8 again.

You have used up your 3 times. You will need to activate or reinstall Windows 7.

9. Close the elevated command prompt. (See screenshot below step 7)

10. Restart the computer to apply the changes and reset your trial period back to 30 days to activate.

That's it,
Shawn

Related Tutorials

**z3r010** · 12-28-2008

Anybody tried this on the new build?

**echrada** · 12-28-2008

Just ran the tutorial and it seemed to work on 7000. Here are screenshots.

tomalan · 01-13-2009

Thanks this will be nice!
When will the full version expect to be out?

**Brink** · 01-13-2009

You're welcome Tomalan, and welcome to Seven Forums.

So far, Windows 7 is scheduled to be released in January 2010. Of course, this may change by then.

**Dinesh** · 01-13-2009

Hi Shawn, you can eliminate the registry hack and just by typing slmgr -rearm in an elevated cmd.exe will extend the trial period upto 120 days. I have tried it and had worked even without the registry hack.

**Dinesh** · 01-13-2009

Quote: Originally Posted by tomalan

Thanks this will be nice!
When will the full version expect to be out?

Hi tomalan, the beta version will end on 1st august 2009 at 5: 30 AM. Thought MS has not revealed the exact date of the official release, but it will be launched as soon as the beta expires.

**Brink** · 01-13-2009

Quote: Originally Posted by dinesh

Hi Shawn, you can eliminate the registry hack and just by typing slmgr -rearm in an elevated cmd.exe will extend the trial period upto 120 days. I have tried it and had worked even without the registry hack.

Dinesh,

By default you should not need to change the registry setting to 0, but it is required to be able to extend the trial period. I only included it to be double checked. Sometimes it may get changed, and will need to be changed to 0.

**Dinesh** · 01-13-2009

got it Shawn, so basically this registry hack is to double check.
But as i said earlier, you are a Geek to the End.

**Brink** · 01-14-2009

LOL, always the details.