Windows Clean Install - a different scenario everytime

kevvyb said:

HP 250 G4 corei5 came with it was either supplied with Windows 10 Home or no operating system at all; I think it was the latter.

...I have just attempted clean install and for some reason Windows 10 Home has been installed and requires me to upgrade which I think defeats the object of a clean install.
What might I be doing wrong?

The only thing you have done wrong is to guess that it came without an OS. It seems that it did in fact come with 10 Home, meaning that there will be a Home key embedded in the bios. In a clean install Setup will see this key and use it to choose the edition to install.

You have two choices.

As you have previously activated Pro on this PC it has an existing digital licence for Pro. It's easy to upgrade this install of Home to Pro, just change the installed key to the generic Pro key: VK7JG-NPHTM-C97JM-9MPGT-3V66T and it will unlock the Pro features.
Generic Product Keys to Install Windows 10 Editions

The other choice is to create a text file containing:

Code:

[EditionID]
Professional
[Channel]
Retail

Rename the file ei.cfg and put it in the sources folder of your install media. It will now only install Pro when you do the next clean install.

Personally I'd just change the installed key. The end result will be the same either way, but it's far quicker to upgrade form Home to Pro than to do another clean install.

Bree said:

The only thing you have done wrong is to guess that it came without an OS. It seems that it did in fact come with 10 Home, meaning that there will be a Home key embedded in the bios. In a clean install Setup will see this key and use it to choose the edition to install.

You have two choices.

As you have previously activated Pro on this PC it has an existing digital licence for Pro. It's easy to upgrade this install of Home to Pro, just change the installed key to the generic Pro key: VK7JG-NPHTM-C97JM-9MPGT-3V66T and it will unlock the Pro features.
Generic Product Keys to Install Windows 10 Editions

The other choice is to create a text file containing:

Code:

[EditionID]
Professional
[Channel]
Retail

Rename the file ei.cfg and put it in the sources folder of your install media. It will now only install Pro when you do the next clean install.

Personally I'd just change the installed key. The end result will be the same either way, but it's far quicker to upgrade form Home to Pro than to do another clean install.

Thanks

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kevvyb said:

The other choice is to create a text file containing:
Code:

[EditionID]
Professional
[Channel]
Retail

Rename the file ei.cfg and put it in the sources folder of your install media. It will now only install Pro when you do the next clean install.

Wanted to test this out. It did not work. Installed Home again. Even when I was disconnected from internet throughout.

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kevvyb said:

Thanks

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Wanted to test this out. It did not work. Installed Home again. Even when I was disconnected from internet throughout.

I just realised why it din't work. Windows saved the file with a txt extension on top of the name you advised.

kevvyb said:

Windows saved the file with a txt extension on top of the name you advised.

To avoid this in the future, I suggest you go to File explorer, View menu, Options, Change folder & search options, View tab
& clear the checkbox for Hide extensions for known file types.


With that box cleared, it is unlikely that you could be trapped into the unwanted .txt by Notepad or other text editors.

All the best,
Denis

kevvyb said:

I just realised why it didn't work. Windows saved the file with a txt extension on top of the name you advised.

That's why I advised to 'rename' rather than 'save as'.