Is Windows 10 dual boot allowed?

AlexA1 · 17 Dec 2018

Hello,

I've been recently thinking of purchasing another Windows 10 licence that I could install on a second drive of the same PC so I could dual boot between them and keep files (and any potential malware) separated. My question is: could 2 digital licences be tied to the same hardware ID or is dual boot with the same version not allowed?

ThrashZone · 17 Dec 2018

Hi,
Not sure what real good it would do
Any connected disk would be just as corruptible as the one you get infected on.

Best dual boot would be with only one disk connected at that time
Or I suppose running as virtual os vmware/....

AlexA1 · 17 Dec 2018

ThrashZone said:

Hi,
Not sure what real good it would do
Any connected disk would be just as corruptible as the one you get infected on.

Best dual boot would be with with only one disk connected at that time
Or I suppose running as virtual os vmware/....

I was planning on getting a rack too for disconnecting the drives and I couldn't use VM because I would need GPU performance on both of them.

ThrashZone · 17 Dec 2018

Hi,
I use one of these
Amazon.com: Vantec 2.5-Inch Dual Bay Trayless SATA III - 6G Mobile Rack (MRK-225S6-BK): Computers Accessories

It's great for dual/... booting
I have a couple 10 installs on different ssd's no problems but don't connect both at the same time obviously only the ssd ID is different.
No new license required technically only one in use at any one time perfectly legal...

AlexA1 · 17 Dec 2018

I'm not sure you can dual boot with the same licence. The issue is that i'm not sure you're allowed to even with a second licence.

Berton · 17 Dec 2018

AlexA1 said:

The issue is that i'm not sure you're allowed to even with a second licence.

I think there's a number of Windows users visiting this forum [and others] that have success in doing it. I no longer do it since I have acquired several computers at no cost and have a setup running Win10 RTM, Win10 IP, WinXP and Linux Mint using a KVM.

AlexA1 · 17 Dec 2018

Yeah, I've read it's even possible to do it with one licence but I wanted to do things right and get another licence.

Unfortunately, from what I've read, it looks like you can't have 2 digital licences on the same computer, so I'm just gonna ditch the idea of dual booting.

NavyLCDR · 17 Dec 2018

AlexA1 said:

Yeah, I've read it's even possible to do it with one licence but I wanted to do things right and get another licence.

Unfortunately, from what I've read, it looks like you can't have 2 digital licences on the same computer, so I'm just gonna ditch the idea of dual booting.

Just keep in mind, that is Microsoft's limitation, not yours. If you own two legitimate licenses for Windows 10, then you are perfectly legal to dual boot two installed copies of Windows 10 on the same computer. Dual booting two or more installed copies of windows on the same computer is no issue at all.

AddRAM · 17 Dec 2018

I would think as long as you have a license, you can install as many systems as you want.

Just make sure you remove the letter from the other drive, that way nothing will be written to it when you are not using it.

f14tomcat · 17 Dec 2018

AddRAM said:

I would think as long as you have a license, you can install as many systems as you want.

Just make sure you remove the letter from the other drive, that way nothing will be written to it when you are not using it.

Example of how i "hide" the other drives so there is no cross-pollination

Do this on each changing the letter, to "hide" the other partition from the booted one. No need to remove the drive letter, just hide it.

Hide_L.reg