BIOS Mod will work for sure. you will gain an OEM widows 10 of matching edition for free. MS tech told me they don't care about BIOS mod, as it's considered too difficult for normal people to do, so they don't worry about it. DAZ Loader will also more then likely work. as long as your copy validates (and , with DAZ loader, it WILL) you will get a new genuine oem windows 10 with a oem key tied to your hardware. You may or may not get support since you were the one who performed the upgrade. If you windows 7 does not validate as genuine it will upgrade to a non genuine windows 10, which can only be made genuine by purchasing a key. So PC+Win7+BIOS Mod=free genuine windows 10. And, most likely, PC+Win7+Daz Loader=free genuine windows 10. (you can remove loader after probably) When you download your upgrade exe or ISO, your new key will be pre-injected into it (so says a tech from windows insider program), and will be online activated against your hardware. this is so for Fully Packaged Product they can tie the new key to the same hardware the old one was tied to, and so OEM windows 10 upgrade can be tied to your hardware and become non transferrable. After the install/upgrade you are expected to create recovery media with the MS tool, and use this if you have to replace your hard drive to restore your OS. So free windows 10 for life? YES, provided you have your computer in the year of free upgrades. If you want to transfer this free windows 10 to a new computer, upgrade a Fully Packaged Product (paid for) 8.1 or 7.
I think Shenj has it right, MS is going for big user numbers. That will earn them money into the future and may put Apple and Google under some pressure. MS used piracy to get an advantage before in the 3.1 days. Where a PC running a pirated copy of Windows, was better than it running a competing OS. Injecting a key into every down would be a lot of hassle and could cause major bottle necks. It would make far more sense to generate a key for each download, which is then locked to that H/W on activation. Basically the same as the 'Anytime Upgrades' As for the 'Recovery Media' we all know how well that will work. p.s. I like your nic
being free for a year, no matter how it gets the free upgrade will be null and void after the year? LOL that mean they gonna deactivate you after that year and force you to pay!!!!!!!!!!! ok just stirring the pot.
Just to mention my assumption is not random. We have 3 OEM licenses. 2 of them come with hardware/are preinstalled. OEM:SLP always together with OEM:COA, both tied to the PC, installation is effort of the OEM. And OEM 'system builder' NOT preinstalled actually meant to be tied to a particular PC / but to tie it is in conflict with some national laws. All those are NOT retail, though. My assumption is also based on the fact that legit OEM:SLP licenses have also a COA sticker which could be used to differentiate pirates the easy way. Sure time will tell. If they need money they spread the drug. @EFA11 If I got them right they say w10 is available for free one year long after it's released, but the license is an entire lifetime of the device (PC/notebook or whatever...)
There is no "COA verfication" step for consumers planned, you click button, you get upgraded to W10.. that's the full process, also do you seriously think there are soo many people with bios mods that Microsoft should really complicate the upgrade path to the average consumer which will backfire because most people will simply not bother upgrading if they have to go to some website enter some key that they may not even be able to read anymore etc, it's just not going to happen. Microsoft needs longterm USERS not shortterm $$$.
Recovery media works fine with windows 8 and 8.1 it will work fine with 10 as well. And I'm not lying about the key injection. I was told this on the windows insider program forums when I asked, by a MS employee. They are giving every non enterprise/VLK version a new windows 10 key for a year, and it will be pre-injected into the download, so the end user doesn't have to worry about it.. Anyoen else in the program cn easily read my thread about the free upgrade. they said they were still working on the clean install after the year is up problem, but that if you upgrade a fully packaed product, you can transfer the license to a new pc even after the year is up.
Now, if you reinstall after that one year is an issue. You will more than likely not be able to use that key again after that year. I guess an image of a clean fresh install before updates would be in order just to have that covered for future needs. Then, if there are changes to hardware, could that image be used to recover Win10 and it would keep its activation hehe.
If you only want to do a clean install on the same HDD/PC you can use the RESET feature which will do the same thing as a clean install but keep your activation intact so there really is no need to re-install W7/W8 to install W10. If you download the Image instead of the WU upgrade (not sure about WU) there is also a Dialog that lets you simply check "keep nothing" and you have your "clean" installation, it obviously creates windows.old but that can simply be removed if you don't need it, installing either W7/W8 or W10 from scratch is wasted if you only goal is a fresh start for the installation.
I think the issue then isn't that the serial won't reactivate after one year anymore. They provide free serials when the criteria are met until one year is over. When activating within that year a hardware hash will be tied to it the first time. When you change too much of it, the license expires since it's considered then as 'another device'. This is at least how I'd translate what I have read so far.
That's how I understand the 'Anytime Upgrade' and the free 'WMC' upgrade work, and it makes sense for MS to use the same process for the 'free' Windows 10 upgrades. Plus if zaphod is right and they inject the key into the D/L the clean install problem disappears, as it will match the activated 'hardware hash' on the MS servers. Hey... isn't that Bchat's job
possibly. but that would all depend on if the key used with skype was black listed from 1,000,000 attempts to use the same one.
Ummm... the tweet says: Upgrading a PIRATED Windows 7, 8, or 8.1, will result in a PIRATED Windows 10, which can be LEGALIZED (I assume he means purchasing a legal key) or ILLEGALLY activate.