this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2023
416 points (96.8% liked)

Technology

59455 readers
4086 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
L3s
[email protected]
[email protected]
L4s
enu
416
You can no longer activate new Windows 11 builds with Windows 7 or 8 keys; maybe last chance to activate using Windows 7 or 8 keys, for 22H2. (www.neowin.net)
submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/technology
124 comments fedilink hide all child comments
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] dangblingus 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nope. On all of my machines I installed Windows 10 using an official usb boot disk with a distro straight from Microsoft. It was 100% free, I didn't need an account, and I'm not being prompted to activate, nor do I have the annoying little watermark in the bottom right of my screen.

I seriously don't understand how people are paying to use Windows when Microsoft gives it away for free.

[โ€“] Trollception 3 points 1 year ago

Were those OEM machines? Often times OEM computers will come with a Windows OS license during purchase and I think Windows may check the hardware thumbprint of the machine and license it automatically. Windows 10/11 is certainly not free for people who build their own machine from parts.