Here's how to manually download Windows 10 and-or make a install disk/USB

[James Mason]

Basically just use the media creation tool, it's all easily explained on the microsoft page:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/media-creation-tool-install?ocid=ms_wol_win10

Some tips before doing your upgrade, grab Display Driver Uninstaller, as your graphics drivers may not work off the bat:
http://www.guru3d.com/files-get/display-driver-uninstaller-download,20.html
And also grab the WINDOWS 10 version of your graphics driver, don't use any auto detect, manually select and download the driver for your GPU for Windows 10:
http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us
http://support.amd.com/en-us/download

When upgrading your computer, you'll be given the option on what files you want to keep. Your 3 options will be.
Keep apps and documents. (everything basically, only your old windows goes away, everything else will stay and still work)
Keep only documents. (only your docs and media files)
Keep nothing. (This performs a clean install)

After upgrading your old CD-Key/Product Key will be different, you can use various system information/diagnostic software available on the web to find out exactly what it is. I recommend Belarc Advisor www.belarc.com/free_download.html (it will scan your system then make a local HTML document (webpage, but it's not on the web don't worry) and down in software licenses it will show you your new product key. It also still thinks windows 10 is windows 8 for now, but don't worry)

 

[Darkbreeze]

You forgot to change the thread type to discussion. I changed it for you. I'm not positive either, but I did read that the upgrade to 10 generates an entirely new product key and that the older OS gets shifted to a no longer valid list of product keys.

Right. I haven't seen anything definite, but I think that after you upgrade, it communicates with their servers and moves your Win7/8/8.1 key out of the list of valid keys for that OS, and into a list of a valid keys for Win10. I haven't seen this anywhere, but since you can download and install a fresh copy of Win 10 after you upgrade, it is the only explanation that makes sense to me. Although, I suppose they could issue you an entirely new key after upgrading and just make the old one invalid for use, but it is really the same difference.

That has by no means been verified yet though, so I'll report back on that if I find out anything definite.

 

[James Mason]

You forgot to change the thread type to discussion. I changed it for you. I'm not positive either, but I did read that the upgrade to 10 generates an entirely new product key and that the older OS gets shifted to a no longer valid list of product keys.

Right. I haven't seen anything definite, but I think that after you upgrade, it communicates with their servers and moves your Win7/8/8.1 key out of the list of valid keys for that OS, and into a list of a valid keys for Win10. I haven't seen this anywhere, but since you can download and install a fresh copy of Win 10 after you upgrade, it is the only explanation that makes sense to me. Although, I suppose they could issue you an entirely new key after upgrading and just make the old one invalid for use, but it is really the same difference.

That has by no means been verified yet though, so I'll report back on that if I find out anything definite.

Yeah, I actually noticed it right after I hit the submit button, but it was too late, and I can't change it myself, thanks.
I guess we'll know later today/tomorrow (depending on where you live) what happens to the product key, i'll be able to compare it to my old one anyways.

 

[James Mason]

Yeah, So i checked my system with Aida64 and the first section of my Windows 10 product key is different from my old Windows 8 key, I'll need to grab a different program to record the whole thing later though.

 

[Darkbreeze]

So that's one suspicion confirmed. It's interesting though because in the past, people had to reinstall their windows 8 OS, AND activate it, each time they wanted to do a clean install and get back to the 8.1 platform unless they used the media creator and the bypass method to go directly to 8.1 using their Windows 8 key. I half thought it might still be the same process but apparently not. Now it remains to be seen if the prior qualifying product key was made inactive during the upgrade or if it's still good. I have to agree with some opinions that it will not be since I doubt MS wants to allow users to now have TWO keys with two products that both work, for the price of one.

 

[utgotye]

So that's one suspicion confirmed. It's interesting though because in the past, people had to reinstall their windows 8 OS, AND activate it, each time they wanted to do a clean install and get back to the 8.1 platform unless they used the media creator and the bypass method to go directly to 8.1 using their Windows 8 key. I half thought it might still be the same process but apparently not. Now it remains to be seen if the prior qualifying product key was made inactive during the upgrade or if it's still good. I have to agree with some opinions that it will not be since I doubt MS wants to allow users to now have TWO keys with two products that both work, for the price of one.

This is one reason why I'm not sure what the rush is for some people. It's far from a polished product. and if you go ahead an upgrade and don't like it, you're SOL unless you feel like dropping some coin for another W7/W8.1 license.

I'm in no hurry. I'm updating my laptop and I'll play on that but if my desktop is on W10 before the beginning of 2016, I'd be shocked.

 

[James Mason]

This is one reason why I'm not sure what the rush is for some people. It's far from a polished product. and if you go ahead an upgrade and don't like it, you're SOL unless you feel like dropping some coin for another W7/W8.1 license.

I'm in no hurry. I'm updating my laptop and I'll play on that but if my desktop is on W10 before the beginning of 2016, I'd be shocked.

Or you can go back to your old version:

So now I've got 3 of my PCs on Windows 10 pro. My original test PC that had insider did it on the 28th after a restart. My main computer did it last night. And my PC I have at work did it as well... though I wasn't "expecting" it to "work" on that one. >_>

 

[Math Geek]

for the fun of it i am upgrading an old acer aspire one netbook that came with win 7 starter to win 10 just to see how it goes. i'm curious if it helps it be any faster since it is super slow even surfing the web. my dad bought it and hates it so i play around with it every now and then.

thought i'd see if win 10 is faster real world on such low end hardware (1.6 ghz atom n2600 cpu and 2 gb ram)

 

[James Mason]

I doubt it will be faster, except booting up maybe.

 

[Math Geek]

good news is that this download link has easily done the upgrade. i did not reserve a copy or any of that stuff and have not even run windows update on this netbook in a long while. it's installing as i type this with no issues thus far. so i assume that others can use this as an upgrade approach as well if they don't feel like waiting.

personally i'd wait until the geeks get their hands on this before doing the upgrade so we know the answers to all the questions being asked. right now no one has had any time to explore so all these questions are hard to answer at this time.

 

[James Mason]

I'm kinda surprised how many people who aren't good with computers are just rushing into the update.
I've encountered a few problems that I didn't know the cause or solution to, but tried a few things I know to get them to respond and they worked out.

 

[Math Geek]

it is funny considering the last couple months has been full of "what if" questions and we have been saying over and over wait a while so we can figure this out.

but nnnnnoooooooo they just have to dive right in and then come her with "OMG I NEED HELP FAST!!!!!" threads like we have the time to troubleshoot all these installs before even finishing our own. oh well. i'm basically avoiding all these threads for now until i can do some playing and tinkering.

 

[Darkbreeze]

I wish the moderation team could do the same, but unfortunately cannot. I would like to make this my little contribution to the process, in the hopes somebody else will find humor in my frustration with a process that after 20 years of refinement since Windows 95, you'd think they could have come up with a slightly more detailed way to let you know WTF was going on.

 

[Math Geek]

heheheheheheheh

that's about right. so far i am pleased with the upgrade process. have one preview and one home upgrade running and both went easily and without a hitch so far. i have about 50 in the wings waiting to upgrade once i figure out what the deal is. many old clients running wn 7 and 8 are interested and have asked me about it. i believe the majority arre waiting for me to give the green light before making it happen. a bunch have asked me to do it for them and some are willing to pull the trigger themselves so long as i am willing to offer help if needed. this is why i am spending so much tme on this right now so i can hopefully hav all the answers to the questions before they are asked. i did make one mistake and forgot the insider build is pro and the upgrade i did was home. so the first fresh install was fubar since was trying pro with home key which DID NOT WORK!!

today i will focus on seeing if the upgrade key works on a separate pc than the one it was upgraded from. got usb installer made and will be starting it shortly.
this is going to be a fun couple weeks as my life is going to revolve around upgrading win 10 for the foreseeable future

 

[Darkbreeze]

As is all of our lives. It's like this EVERY time a new OS is released, perhaps even more so this time though considering the FREE nature of the upgrade for most users.

Windows 8.1 was similar though since all Windows 8 users were eligible once they were updated to a certain point.

 

[Math Geek]

alright so today i verified that i can do a fresh install of win 10 from the usb drive on the netbook WITHOUT entering any key and simply skipping these screens when they show. once installed and running it is already activated and key finder is giving me the same key it gave after the upgrade was done yesterday.

it did not however work on a separate pc. the key did not work nor was it activated after fresh installation. so it seems it gets tied to the hardware in some way and knows this pc is good but that one is not.

that what has worked for me so far. upgrade went smooth, fresh install was fine as well but no installation on different pc than got the upgrade.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Yes. After the initial installation, if you went through the upgrade process and activated the machine, the Win10 installation becomes tied to your bios hardware string.

 

[Astralv]

What if someone has the same key Win 8 on 2 computers- what would happen to the 2nd computer running Win 8 after they upgrade first computer? Will the second computer deactivate and start asking for the key? Will it boot? Will it be turned in to 15 days trial?

 

[James Mason]

What if someone has the same key Win 8 on 2 computers- what would happen to the 2nd computer running Win 8 after they upgrade first computer? Will the second computer deactivate and start asking for the key? Will it boot? Will it be turned in to 15 days trial?

That's technically impossible unless you're pirating.
Windows 8 licenses don't have multi system installs.
When Windows detects you used a windows 8 key on a new computer, it deactivates it on the old one.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Kind of. Actually what happens is, if the product key is activated on one client, and you try to activate it on another, it rejects it unless you verify that this new installation is the only one. Then, at some future point when the OS calls home on the other machine, using a different hardware string, that unit will revert to an unactivated status. Pretty much the same thing. Unless of course it's a corporate license and is a VALID corporate license, in which case it can be used with however many machines it's licensed to be used with, but the Windows 10 free upgrade doesn't apply to corporate licenses anyhow so it's not relevant.

 

[Astralv]

What if someone has the same key Win 8 on 2 computers- what would happen to the 2nd computer running Win 8 after they upgrade first computer? Will the second computer deactivate and start asking for the key? Will it boot? Will it be turned in to 15 days trial?

That's technically impossible unless you're pirating.
Windows 8 licenses don't have multi system installs.
When Windows detects you used a windows 8 key on a new computer, it deactivates it on the old one.

Technically...

 

[Darkbreeze]

Yeah, not "technically". More like "period". Unless you're using an unlicensed copy of windows, that's how it works. And if you're using the same product on two machines, then you're using an unlicensed copy on one of them. Not technically, more like unequivocally.

 

[Fierce Guppy]

After the upgrade using the USB method, my new product keys for Windows 10 Pro on BOTH PCs are identical. (...-3V66T as reported by Aida64). This is especially disconcerting when one had an 8.1 Pro full retail licence and the other an 8.1 pro OEM license.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Your product keys, or your product ID'S? Two different things. If you're going off what's listed on the control panel system applet, that's the product ID, not the product key. You would need to use a utility to extract the product key from the bios in order to see that.

 

[Math Geek]

i have now done the upgrade on a couple more pc's and am getting that same key everyone else is after upgrade. i believe that my first experience with my old netbook gave me a different key due to the fact that i upgraded windows 7 "starter" edition vs the home and pro editions everyone else has. everyone agrees that the other versions each give a specific key when upgraded and i guess i just have the generic key you get from the "starter" edition as well. it's just no one is updating the starter edition that i can find to verify, but i am pretty sure this will also be a generic key as well. mine starts with t49td
and googling the whole string yields no results unlike the other generic keys which point to the lists everyone else has linked to.

i can't be the only person in the world who upgraded starter edition

anyway, the fresh install has now worked on 4 pc's after the upgrade. no issues, simply skip the pages asking for a key and it'll be activated and such when it is done.

now for the fun, i have a load of pc's coming in this wekend for the upgrade and many want the fresh install. gonna be up to my eyeballs in win 10 for the next week or more thank goodness i'm set-up to handle 6 at a time to help speed it along.kids gonna make some shopping money helping me get all this done, they are more than familiar with installing windows so they gonna be a lot of help.