deactivate windows 7 in order to reinstall on another PC

[whyld4900]

Hello,
I have a Toshiba laptop that came with Win 7 Home premium 64-bit. I installed Win 7 Pro 64-bit on top of Home Premium. Now I want to but a new laptop and move Win 7 Pro to the new laptop. Do I have to deactivate the Win 7 Pro? If so how do I do that?

 

[richc46]

Welcome
You must uninstall Pro by installing another OS over it or format it
Then just install in the new computer.
You can install as many times as you like but one computer at a time.

 

[bobkn]

There is no explicit deactivation.

You are supposed to uninstall it from the first machine before installing it on the second. You may have to activate the new installation by telephone, as the key is already in use.

I have read claims that if you activate a second machine with the key and connect the old machine to the net, the installation on the old machine will be marked as not genuine. I'm fairly sure that was false in the XP days, but I don't know about with Win7.

 

[theog]

How to use Toshiba Recovery.
How to use the Toshiba HDD Recovery Utility

You can order Toshiba Recovery disks from here:
https://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/tais/support/jsp/serviceUnitVerification.jsp

 

[alphanumeric]

You can deactivate windows 7 > http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/165472-product-key-number-uninstall-deactivate-windows.html
I'm not sure there is any real advantage to doing it in this case though. You can have a look and make up your own mind though. Maybe do the above and then try this. > UNAWAVE - Downgrade Ultimate to Home Premium or Professional

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Hello whyld4900, welcome to Seven Forums!



The way to deactivate an activation key is to type slmgr -upk into an elevated command window, have a look at the snip below, be sure that you don't do it until you are ready as it will make Windows non-genuine at the next reboot.

click to enlarge

​

Edit: Now I see the tutorial was posted above.

 

[gregrocker]

I would try alpha's downgrade workaround to change from Ultimate to Home Premium, then at Computer>Properties change the Product Key back to the Home Premium key on the COA sticker which came with the computer.

If you plan to sell the laptop, I'd also consider running the Recovery Disks to set it back to factory conditions with all the utilties (and bloatware) that came with it.

 

[bobkn]

You can deactivate windows 7 > http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/165472-product-key-number-uninstall-deactivate-windows.html

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this deactivates Win7 on the local machine. It does not reset the Microsoft activation server and free up the license key. There's not much point in doing this.

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

You can deactivate windows 7 > http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/165472-product-key-number-uninstall-deactivate-windows.html

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this deactivates Win7 on the local machine. It does not reset the Microsoft activation server and free up the license key. There's not much point in doing this.

Hello whyld4900, welcome to Seven Forums!

The way to deactivate an activation key is to type slmgr -upk into an elevated command window, have a look at the snip below, be sure that you don't do it until you are ready as it will make Windows non-genuine at the next reboot.

click to enlarge
View attachment 159663
​

Edit: Now I see the tutorial was posted above.

It must free up the key at the servers if it does this.

 

[Barman58]

I can confirm that the licence server must be updated, as the copy of win7 will fail the next licence check and present the black screen and not genuine message

 

[Bill2]

You can deactivate windows 7 > http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/165472-product-key-number-uninstall-deactivate-windows.html

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this deactivates Win7 on the local machine. It does not reset the Microsoft activation server and free up the license key. There's not much point in doing this.

Hello whyld4900, welcome to Seven Forums!

The way to deactivate an activation key is to type slmgr -upk into an elevated command window, have a look at the snip below, be sure that you don't do it until you are ready as it will make Windows non-genuine at the next reboot.

click to enlarge
View attachment 159663
​

Edit: Now I see the tutorial was posted above.

It must free up the key at the servers if it does this.

No, whats probably happening here is that the -upk switch uninstalls the currently installed product key and the license status reverts to trial. Now the trial is valid only for 30 days (extendable to 120 with rearm) which period has presumably already expired on said computer.