Don't think so. If it's UUID of the machine plus a MAC address, changing the motherboard changes both. Unless there's a mechanism to update this ID (on their servers) when you change the board, it will be recognized as a different machine.
I would say that I trust Microsoft more than any stranger! From own experiences over some years I could say that Microsoft always accepted such change, with no exception!
And that's why they were pretty lax with calling in to activate. Haven't you heard stories about people having legitimate licenses having to do phone activation? It even happened to me on my Windows 8.1 tablet after it came back from service and got switched over to a Microsoft Signature image.
A quick question: I have win 8.1 installed and activated with a retail key, if i upgrade NOW to TP, does my "key" still get the windows 10 free upgrade? Or i need to revert back to 8.1 and update after july 29?
Its different rules for different countries, I don't know about Thailand. But in Germany you can move (some) OEM licenses from PC to PC. Ask Slave77, he seems kinda proud about it.
Short answer:YES. Long answer: You should qualify by having a Windows 8.1 key and if you register as an Insider you'll qualify by using your MS Account on the TP.
Once again you come up with different rules According to MS Thailand! Come on every motherboard has different UUID even if it is same brand. And I also think we have had similar discussion before a while back And mabey yes before you may change motherboard but you still had OEM:COA key
and that's the way it should be in the rest of the world because any other way is criminal. if you buy software you should have the right to use it however you want and as long as you want and even to sell it to somebody else
Hold on here OEM as in you by OEM version from supplier i,e, oem disk or system builders disk that is supposed to be tied to first machine it is activated on. Ok seemingly in Germany you can transfer that licence. But not on a Machine that comes with windows pre-installed say slp activation, but you lose your original disk and need to reinstall windows then you can use your OEM:COA key that is not transferable. Ok you could keep your old machine OEM:SLP and build new machine and call M$ with OEM:COA key to activate new machine, did you pay for two licences no
I could not speak for the rest of the world as I'm in Thailand under the jurisdiction of Microsoft Thailand related to Microsoft Products and Licensing. Just 2 weeks ago we had to change a few MB's on Acer and HP/Compac machines with newer MB's because the older not on sale anymore. Same (new) customer, just to mention, which used OEM Licenses for his Office Computers, mixed Intel and AMD architecture. ALL were activated manually via Phone with no problems and from those Guy in Activation Center we got the say that we just need to use the same Brand/Architecture for new MB's, (which we did)! At those activation, we'd one Product key changed my mistake from an Intel to an AMD machine and were need to re-change again, which were lead to out question about that to that guy. even we didn't told him the Brand, the HW-ID will show what Brand is used and those HW-ID is part of the Computer-ID we have to submit within the activation process, That also shows that the new HW-ID is compared on MS Database with the old/initial HW-ID within the process. For some of those Machine we had the CoA Sticker (Windows 7 Ultimate) and for some None (Windows 8). Even 2 of the Windows 7 machines were updated to Windows 8.1 in the past with no present CoA Sticker. All activation were done with nor problems and that's the only things which counts (for us and our customers)!
I have arrived aka I'm good with windows licensing. Windows 10 uses a different key set than Windows 8.1. When Windows 10 reaches RTM it will probably accept an upgrade key that is verified against an existing activation within the OS's that can be upgraded. However that being said in terms of what is used to check for the activation. Microsoft checks the hardware hashes in order to make a product key which is why we haven't seen a OEM activation means for Windows 8 / 8.1. Now on the technical preview side every beta OS accepts keys from the previous stable OS. This mean for Windows 8 beta it accepted Windows 7 keys. This is not a new thing guys. Keep in mind this is a lot of information being crunched into a summary lol.