Have Windows 7 and 10 activated with same product key

[MisterEd]

Back in 2022 I bought a Windows 7 Pro key online. Note it was available from a number of sellers online. I installed Windows 7 Pro on a desktop computer and activated it with the key.

I got an old Toshiba laptop with a bad hard drive last year. I didn't know what its Windows 7 key was. It didn't even come with Windows 7. In July 2023 I wanted to buy another Windows 7 Pro key for it but could couldn't find anywhere online to buy it. A friend had a spare one and gave it to me. I installed Windows 7 on the laptop. It activated OK. A month later I did the free upgrade to Windows 10 Pro. I am glad I did because I found out that sometime in September 2023 Microsoft stopped allowing the free upgrade.

Now I am wondering if all the online sellers got the word that Microsoft was discontinuing the free upgrade of Windows 7 to Windows 10. Would that be enough of a reason for them to stop selling Windows 7 keys?

Out of curiosity late last year I replace the Toshiba's hard drive with another one and installed Window 7 Pro on it. I used the same Windows 7 Pro key that I got back in July. I was surprised that it activated OK. Now I have two hard drives for that computer. One with Windows 7 Pro and one with Windows 10 Pro on it.

Earlier this year I put the Windows 10 Pro hard drive back in the computer. It still worked fine and appears to be still activated.

Has anyone else done this? Is it OK to have drives with both Windows 7 and 10 that were technically activated using the same key?

 

[siliconbeaver]

It's manufactured computer (than home-built).
hence it should behave like that.
my HP PC is same, no need of activate code. no need to activate. once OS clean-installed. its activation has been done.

even more,
it's noticed that, if Office2010 was installed on the PC. its clean-install doesn't need online activation too. it's activated automatically.
In past. clean-install requested re-activate one-by-one. In time of AI. it seems changed.
MSFT Windows and Office, clean-install, no need of re-activation, if activated on same PC in past.

 

[MisterEd]

Yes it is a manufactured laptop but it was built in 2006 before they started embedding the product key in the BIOS. It originally came with Windows XP Tablet Edition. The only key it has is on a faded label on its bottom.

BTW, I forgot to mention that the 1st hard drive only has Windows 10 Pro on it. The 2nd hard drive is a dual-boot of Windows 7 Pro and Windows XP Tablet Edition. That product key on the bottom of the computer did come in handy.

 

[michael diemer]

I bought a reconditioned HP Elite 8300 a few months ago. It came with W7 Pro, but was not activated. The label on the machine had a key for W7 HP. That did not work for activation. I have an older machine with W7 Pro, which I had had built by Magic Micro in Ohio. I tried that key, and it worked, even though it was technically OEM. Figuring out what works these days with activation for W7 is beyond me at this point. I think Microsoft should just make W7 open source, since they don't really seem to care that much about it. The only reason it is still receiving updates is because enterprise versions are still going strong, especially in 2nd- and 3rd-world nations.

 

[siliconbeaver]

I would go HP web, download W7 install media from the HP Cloud Recovery

Using the HP Cloud Recovery Tool

no need of activate code. no need to activate. once OS clean-installed. its activation has been done. it works for HP PC only. (no Dell. no Lenovo, , ,)


SIW2's link
https://www.sevenforums.com/install...-windows-7-bios-csm-mbr-disk.html#post3518981

I bought a reconditioned HP Elite 8300 a few months ago.

 

[michael diemer]

I would go HP web, download W7 install media from the HP Cloud Recovery

Using the HP Cloud Recovery Tool

no need of activate code. no need to activate. once OS clean-installed. its activation has been done. it works for HP PC only. (no Dell. no Lenovo, , ,)


SIW2's link
https://www.sevenforums.com/install...-windows-7-bios-csm-mbr-disk.html#post3518981

I wish I had known that a few weeks ago. but then, I would have missed out on the joy of reinstalling Windows 7. Nothing more exciting than "Windows is preparing your computer for first use"...