Hi, I was wondering if I resized my partitions for windows 8 WMC (delete one partition and make the win8 WMC one bigger) would that break the activation? also if I saved the activation files and a decided to reinstall on a bigger partition (same computer) after formatting if I would lose activation as well? Sorry if this question is stupid.
In both cases as long as the 350mb system partition remains in tact you should be ok however when resizing sometimes things can go south .. backing up activation and reinstalling on same hardware and HDD should prevent any disaster
nothing really just less of a chance it sees it as a hardware change or tries to install it elsewhere ..
which 350mb partition are u talking about? like the system files? what I wanna do is delete my win7 partition and move the win8 partition to the front of the disk. so I would be safer to backing up the activation and reinstalling? thanks! ps. also to back up do we just copy the dat files they mention in the forum or is there a program for it?
Even if that would be the case, reactivation is easy as long as you didn't change the MB and HDD together it will be done automatic, and if you change the MB, phone activation is on order but difficult. The change of the partition scheme will normally not affect the activation because the hardware ID will still be the same.
You can do it since before all make the activation backup to restore after. Repartitioning really are not a problem for the activation system since you have the same hardware.
If you installed Win 8 as an additional OS on an existing Win 7 drive, the boot files for Win 8 will be on the Win 7 partition. If you delete the Win 7 partition, Win 8 will no longer boot. You can check this by looking at your partition layout, if you see an initial 100MB partition followed by your Win 7 partition, followed by your Win 8 partition. Then this will be the case. Win 8 uses a 350MB partition to boot.
AFAIK the 100MB and 350MB Partitions from Windows 7 and 8 will NOT be used for booting. That's System Reserved Partitions for to use in case of emergency and/or recovery. Those partitions may also be used for Dual Boot by BCD if more than one OS is installed on the same HDD. That Partition are not really needed if only one OS is on HDD and could be deleted, but recommended to do that!
What I have said is correct, you can try for yourself. Make an image of your system on a separate drive(I use Acronis True Image) first. Then delete the 350MB partition, your system will not boot (partition contains Boot Folder, Recovery Folder and System Volume Information Folder). You can then reinstate the 350MB partition using Acronis boot disk, system will now boot. I have also found that if you use 1 drive for your Win 8 OS and another for storage, Win 8 will not create a 350MB partition, it places the boot files on the storage drive. If the storage drive is removed Win 8 will not boot. This only happens if Win 8 is installed with the storage drive in place, that is why when I build Win 8 systems I remove any other drive while installing the OS and add any additional drives in afterwards.
Before deleting anything , gotta make sure you move the boot data to win 8 using BCD or else. Win 8 has to become the active boot partition. I too was dual booting before, and I didnt mess with any 100mb partition, hell i dont even see one. Either way, booting of win 8 install media will fix any boot mess but still it is a headache that can be avoided.