My windows 10 has an activation expiration date, what to do?

NavyLCDR said:

And if you get asked to enter a product key, you know something is not going right and to cancel it.
A proper upgrade should not ask for a product key.

Good point - and uninterrupted online upgrade.

If you download the ISO and you have enough space on your drive, you can extract the contents of the ISO to a new folder and run setup from that folder.

7-Zip is a lightweight utility that will open compressed folders and extract the contents if you don't already have a similar utility. Download the bit-depth (32-bit or 64-bit) of version 9.20 that corresponds to your system architecture
(the first two (9.38 | 15.06) are still in beta)

Download 7-Zip from here: http://www.7-zip.org/download.html

reqwed said:

what is this and how do you run one? slmgr /dlv and then /xpr
Mine says no KMS can be found. I don't know what this is but can you please explain how to fix it?

To determine the install status of your machine, execute the following commands in a
Command Prompt (Admin) window:

slmgr /dlv
slmgr /xpr
req query HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsSelfHost /s

You are running a system successfully upgraded to Windows 10 if

slmgr /dlv does NOT have an Evaluation End Date
- and -
there are no keys under WindowsSelfHost

You are running an evaluation of Windows 10, (aka the Insider Program) if:

slmgr /dlv reports an Evaluation End Date
- or -
reg query returns any keys under WindowsSelfhost

It's also possible that you are running the 30-day trial of Windws 10.
That can be determined form the slmgr /dlv report - the wording might be different, but the information should be in the same area as the Evaluation End Date information. It might have the word expire in the label reference.

Some confusion might have arisen when people 'migrated' from the Insider builds to an upgraded system. If a system was upgraded but you did not leave the Insider program, then the upgraded system is still participating in the Technical Preview and will be offered build updates when MS releases them to the flight rings. If that is what you intended then there is no issue - just be aware that you are running Preview builds, not an upgraded system. You can always do a Clean install to get back to a Current build install (RTM, Retail... whatever name works for you).

Below the fold are reports from two of my machines

1. Win7 Home Prem upgraded to Windows 10
   Fowwloed by a Clean install on that machine
   
   
2. Insider Technical Preview
   currently on build 10.0.525

---

slmgr /dlv & slmgr /xpr

---

Upgraded system	Insider Preview install

---

reg query HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsSelfHost /s

---

Upgraded system

Insider Technical Preview

\WindowsSelfHost Type Value ----- ----- -----

\WindowsSelfHost Type Value FlightingOwnerGUID REG_SZ 6dc60aab-52b3-4001-a1aa-f48298e97033 EnablePreviewBuilds REG_DWORD 0x2 Ring REG_SZ WIF RingBackup REG_SZ WIS ThresholdRiskLevel REG_SZ low ThresholdOptedin REG_DWORD 0x1 BranchName REG_SZ th2_release UserPreferredBranchName REG_SZ th2_release \ ... \Timestamps Type Value BranchNameTimestamp REG_SZ 2015-08-19 20:23:56.799 bBranchNameTimestamp REG_BINARY 6A657AF9BCDAD001