Cant change product key?

I solved the issue of Win10 freezing when I chose "Change Product Key"...here's how:
--Open Settings and in the Search bar type "UAC"...open the resulting "User Account Control Settings"
--Change the UAC settings to "Always Notify" (you can change this back when we're finished)
--Go back to the "Change Product Key" button....viola! Win10 UAC prompts you about making changes, but the proper Change Product Key pane is displayed

This worked for me; I toggled my UAC settings back to custom when finished :)

Thanks man. I'm sure it will fix my issue, too. I kept seeing UAC UI in Task Manager after clicking Change Product Key, but the prompt wasn't visible. I'll give it a try as soon as I get back home.

Shagam said:

I solved the issue of Win10 freezing when I chose "Change Product Key"...here's how:
--Open Settings and in the Search bar type "UAC"...open the resulting "User Account Control Settings"
--Change the UAC settings to "Always Notify" (you can change this back when we're finished)
--Go back to the "Change Product Key" button....viola! Win10 UAC prompts you about making changes, but the proper Change Product Key pane is displayed

This worked for me; I toggled my UAC settings back to custom when finished :)

tedmanowar said:

Thanks man. I'm sure it will fix my issue, too. I kept seeing UAC UI in Task Manager after clicking Change Product Key, but the prompt wasn't visible. I'll give it a try as soon as I get back home.

You're welcome - I registered just to document the answer to this stupid glitch :) I found that the second/third time I went to the "Change Product Key" I got a red-text warning about needing to be Administrator to Activate. I toggled UAC -again- back/forth and this did the trick...again.

It's not a bug, its a feature!

I got this answer from Microsoft Support.

I was trying to activate a copy of Windows 10 on my sons PC , but for some reason it was coming up as an invalid key (Even though he had a valid version of Windows 8.1 installed previously).

After talking to various support people I got passed up to a senior support person.

Currently , the ONLY way to activate free copies of windows 10 which are having issues getting the activation to work (for invalid key etc) is to go back to the previous OS you had activated , then re-install windows 10 upgrade.

They currently don't have the tools to 'fix' the activation issues manually , (Though the person said work was being done on the tools to allow this and it should be possible 'soon')

johnnybgood said:

When I click on change product key, I got some sound, settings freeze, and thats it.
Bug?

I had the same problem with a fresh install when I allowed Windows 10 to update itself before changing the product key. Going back to a fresh install of Windows 10 and THEN IMMEDIATELY going to Settings, Activation, Change Product Key allowed me to change the product key and activate.

johnnybgood said:

When I click on change product key, I got some sound, settings freeze, and thats it.
Bug?

Type cmd in the search bar, then right click and 'Run as administrator'

In the terminal type:

slmgr.vbs /ipk KEY
slmgr.vbs /ato

Where KEY is your legitimate Windows 10 key.

Best,

Guy

Thank you man. This helped me.

GuyM said:

Type cmd in the search bar, then right click and 'Run as administrator'

In the terminal type:

slmgr.vbs /ipk KEY
slmgr.vbs /ato

Where KEY is your legitimate Windows 10 key.

Best,

Guy

In the search bar, enter "changepk.exe" and hit enter. The window appears.

johnnybgood said:

When I click on change product key, I got some sound, settings freeze, and thats it.
Bug?