I've got a new laptop arriving today and chances are it's pre-loaded by the manufacturer with lots of helpful bloatware. So of course, I am planning to immediately reinstall Windows Home from an official 1809 updated source image, which I've then stripped of Microsoft's own apps using NTLite. I've read that the laptop may come pre-activated with a volume license key and an unused one on the underneath. If this is indeed the case, can I backup the pre-activated license and transfer it to the new installation?
Starting with Windows 8, a unique license key is stored in BIOS, and nothing else. The same goes for Windows 10. Here's how much storage space my brothers new laptop got from a reinstall last summer. Spoiler: Reinstallation in numbers Hp 14 Core i3-7100U Preinstalled 1709 Home 64 Used storage: 34.7 GB - without hibernation, pagefile and swapfile Number of processes: 157 Threads: 2107 Handles: 54606 _____________________________________ Clean install 1803 Pro 64 Used storage: 8.6 GB - without hibernation, pagefile and swapfile Number of processes: 105 Threads: 910 Handles: 34870
The gains aren't as massive here but prior to a vanilla installation the usage was somewhere around 24GB. After a format, it's now 14GB with drivers. That's on 1809 with mainly just the apps removed prior to install. No major modifications to avoid unwanted situations where dependencies are missing. My own installation saves me from running Windows update for ages which is neat. It also activated just fine. Thanks for the info!
You can run the QT from here: https://forums.mydigitallife.net/threads/multi-oem-retail-project-mrp-mk3.71555/#post-1283849 It will show how it's activated, you can safely post the saved report, so we can tell what activation method is used.
Is there more than one type of activation used on computers from the big brands? Maybe I got it all wrong..
OEM Laptops/PC's/Tablets with preinstalled OS are usually activated by SLIC (Vista, 7 and some servers). Or MSDM (8/10). The OP said it probably came with a Volume License activated pre-installed OS, the QT will tell what is used for activation.