Announcing Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 14376 for PC and Mobile Insider

Fafhrd said:

I assume that these VHDs, if returned to their Virtual Machine environment, will retain their Digital Entitlement under the present state of play? - and if the VHDs transferred to other Physical machines but running as VMs will continue to be activated?

The EULA has subtly changed for (Insider) evaluations at some time since 10586 (1511) (I don't know when - does anyone?) to change the contents of clause 2.a.:

"2. Installation and Use Rights.
a. License. The software is licensed, not sold. Under this agreement, we grant you the right to install and run one instance of the software on your device (the licensed device), for use by one person at a time, so long as you comply with all the terms of this agreement. Updating or upgrading from non-genuine software with software from Microsoft or authorized sources does not make your original version or the updated/upgraded version genuine, and in that situation, you do not have a license to use the software."

to

"2. Installation and Use Rights.
a. License. The software is licensed, not sold. Under this agreement, we grant you the right to install the software on your device (the licensed device), up to the software’s expiration date, so long as you comply with all the terms of this agreement. Updating or upgrading from non-genuine software with software from Microsoft or authorized sources does not make your original version or the updated/upgraded version genuine, and in that situation, you do not have a license to use the software."

...so, by the absence of "one instance", it's implied that it is OK to run multiple instances of Windows 10 on a single machine for evaluation purposes, it seems.

Kari said:

No, of course not. When booted back to host OS and virtual machines run, the activation tells that Windows is not activated because the digital entitlement does not match current hardware.

Same when the VHD is copied to another PC; even in native boot it will not be activated if the host machine has no digital entitlement for that edition.

Completely within and in accordance to EULA.

@Fafhrd, Kari is a real "Stickler" for such details(legal activation).
If it was otherwise(using the VHD) he wouldn't even have posted about it, as he knows it would have been misused.
See this tutorial from him: Hyper-V - Native Boot VHD - Windows 10 Forums
It includes a tip to get a legal copy of Windows(insider preview) to be able to run SxS(side by side) with your original activated version:

   Tip

If you are not a Windows Insider but would like to test the latest Windows Insider build to help you decide if opting in to Insider builds would be something for you, you can do it even if you have never had or used Hyper-V or would not even like to set it up.

You can download free 90 day trial Hyper-V Windows 10 virtual machines from Microsoft, both the latest official release (build 10586 when writing this) and latest Insider build (14366).


See this thread for download instructions: Windows 10 virtual machines now available on Microsoft Edge Dev - Windows 10 Forums

You don't have to setup any virtualization software, nor do you need install anything, instead when you have downloaded the vm, mount the VHD it contains as told above and you can dualboot to your chosen Windows 10 build for 90 days, for free :)

Cliff S said:

Kari is a real "Stickler" for such details(legal activation).
If it was otherwise(using the VHD) he wouldn't even have posted about it, as he knows it would have been misused.

Thanks Cliff for the confidence :)

To clarify this, here's the activation page when the VHD of a non-activated Windows Hyper-V vm is mounted and booted natively on a host machine which already has digital entitlement for that specific edition:

Restarting to host OS and launching the same Windows installation (vm for which the VHD belongs to) in Hyper-V, the activation page looks like this:

Absolutely nothing against EULA in this procedure.

badrobot said:

I am 8000 miles (13000kms) away from my Insider machine. Have fun fellow insiders!

And you think you are safe ? The long arm of MS will catch up with you.

Started browsing build 14372 this morning, had a complete lockup, cut off power, restarted opened this forum to see a new build available.
Looking in Update it stated a new build 14376 was available (this being the first time this has happened) normally having had to trigger the update.
Perhaps this loading by M$ was the reason for the breakdown on 14372.
Downloading 14376 on my desktop has just finished.

Whoop, whoop, whoop.

First impression....Edge browser is now working at warp speed compared to previous Build 14372.

Upgrade gave a Repair disk Screen after the first reboot. Seemed to Reboot more times than before.

Downloading it now.. will report back soon.

Installed all right, funny thing though, started upgrade on the phone (Limia 640) at same time and both finished at about same time. That makes me wonder if during upgrades all of PC features (fast 6 core processor, SSD and 8GB of RAM) are used at all ?

All set and so far it's looking fine.
No issues to report so far.