• Drbreen@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    16
    ·
    1 year ago

    I’ve had the same Win8 Pro key that I purchased for $40 when it released 12 years ago. I’ve used it for Win10 and 11. Is this saying if I format my drive and reinstall Win11 that I won’t be able to activate using this key anymore?

    • PotjiePig@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      9
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      If I’m not mistaken your key is linked to your motherboard as well as your Microsoft account. So I think you should be fine. I just formatted my drive yesterday and it didn’t even ask me to type it in, I skipped that step and it verified once I logged in.

      • Drbreen@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        9
        ·
        1 year ago

        OEM keys are linked to motherboards I believe. Mine is a retail key and I’ve used it across many different builds over the years.

        • pjhenry1216@kbin.social
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          1 year ago

          Keys are usually stored in the TPM chip and/or tied to Microsoft accounts if you use one. If you don’t have an account, there’s actually a limit to how often a key can activate new hardware. If there’s no TPM, there’s simply a limit within a certain timeframe that it can be used to activate on the same hardware.

        • tleb@lemmy.ca
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          1 year ago

          Retail keys can also be linked to the hardware or Microsoft account

      • Capitao_Duarte@lemmy.eco.br
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        That on laptop or desktop? I had a laptop and always did like you said. For the first time I have a desktop and don’t know how things go now

        • PotjiePig@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          Super late reply to your question, but when you add Windows and punch in the key it links to the motherboard of the PC (laptop or desktop, doesn’t matter). Once you sign in to your Microsoft account, the key and mobo serial gets stored there. If you bought a new PC and with it a new motherboard you can find your key in your account or use the one on the back of your old laptop and delink it from your old device so that you can reuse it on your new one. It moves with your account.

          Of you do a standard format, you shouldn’t have to worry, but if you ever upgrade your mobo, just make sure you get a screenshot of your serial in the windows settings and make sure you are logged in to your windows account (maybe check the account settings on a browser and see if you can find your devices, not sure of this is a necessary step… but just to make sure it’s linked I guess)… then once you format, you can punch in the old serial and log in, if it pops up a warning, it may ask you to migrate the serial and delete the old device or you may have a step or two on the Microsoft website to do this, I’m a bit hazy on the details as I did this a good 4 years ago, bit it wasn’t much of a headache.