Windows 10: a Warning to Those Who Would “Free” Upgrade

Microsoft have been pushing very hard their free upgrade to Windows 10 for Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 users.

I followed their instructions to make myself an installation disk for Windows 10.

I installed Windows 10 on my computer in the usual manner. During that installation process, the installer had the opportunity to check the state of my C: drive, and establish that there was a valid copy of Windows 7 already present. It seems that it failed to do so.

Following good practice, I deleted all the partitions from my C: drive, removing the clutter that inevitably builds up over time.

After I installed Windows 10, it kept demanding that I give it an activation key. The Windows 7 key did not work.

After about 20 attempts, I finally got through to Microsoft’s support line. I was told because of the way that I had gone about it, I would need to purchase an activation key.

I am not impressed.