So, when Windows 10 first rolled out I upgraded my wife's HP DV6 using Microsoft's free upgrade path. My wife hated it and I rolled back to Win7 within a week. That laptop is still limping along and I'd like to upgrade to 10 again. Would the prior upgrade still be registered with MS? Is the path to upgrade as simple as downloading the media creation tool and running an update? Or would we be forced into a purchase this time around?
You can upgrade an clean install as many times as you wish, no license required.
Note the current build, 1803, is more buggy than 1709. I.e. more users tend to notice problems.
Best, as we continually urge users to do, to create or upgrade a disk image before and after any major change, and periodically. Eg. Macrium Reflect (free).
Note: a few older machines may exhibit issues with one or more drivers.
If there are performance issues with that machine, don't expect installing Win 10 to necessarily fix them.
Basic recommendations: disable or uninstall your AV, disconnect anything you can, make sure you've about 25Gb of free space on C:
And could be a good idea to run a quick disk check before upgrading.
You can make Win 10 a lot friendlier with a more familiar start menu (free) - Classic Shell- and some appearance changes are possible. You don't have to use the universal apps that come with it, or Cortana.
Great! Thanks for the quick reply. This machine is more of a workhorse than a speed demon, perfect for the basic office/school tasks we ask of it. I just bumped to 8gb of ram so 10 should run smoother than the last time we attempted.
I was just worried that our free upgrade from a few years ago may not still be valid. Thanks for the input!
A report I read indicates free upgrades are still validly available - despite MS's statement a year or so ago.
There are various reasons why Win 10 may not run well- some with the current build report (quite commonly) problems with high Defender resource use. A few others find they experience very very low disk transfer speeds (because of low level or other driver incompatibility) - this can differ from build to build of Win 10.
Personally I find build 1709 very stable.
My sister's got my old (2010?) HP DV6 and I just recently did a major clean-up/upgrade to Win10 for her this summer (mid-July). Machine runs kind of warm (mid 50s-60s Celsius) but otherwise works like a champ. You should be able to get at least another year or two out of that PC as long as all the major parts keep going.
HTH,
--Ed--
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