Activation when booting virtual AND bare metal

imrazor · 26 Jun 2021

So I've got an old school Mac Pro with a Boot Camp partition. I recently installed virtualization software called Parallels that is capable of booting the physical Windows disk inside a VM. From a functional perspective, it works great even allowing full DirectX 11 support. But the problem I'm running into is with activation.

Windows 10 Home is perfectly happy when booted from bare metal. But if I try to boot it up in a VM, activation freaks out and starts bleating. If I go back to bare metal, it's happy as a clam again.

I can't be the first person to deal with this. Is there an official Microsoft solution to this dilemma? Technically I *am* running Windows on the same motherboard, CPU, etc., so there shouldn't be a license violation.

Kari · 26 Jun 2021

It's not a dilemma. It is as it has always been, and how it should be.

Windows license facts:

- Windows 10 and Windows 11 use a so called Digital Licensing, based on machine's Hardware ID (HWID). See this post for more information.

- Because of the above, Windows activation (digital license) is no longer valid, if for instance activated machine is cloned and the image transferred to a 100% identical machine, or if as in your case the disk is used on a virtual machine. The virtual machine and your virtualization host are two different machines, having both their unique HWID.

- Whatever virtualization software is used, a Windows virtual machine is absolutely NEVER licensed / activated based on the virtualization host's activation status.

Kari

NavyLCDR · 28 Jun 2021

Also, from the Windows 10 End User License Agreement:

(iv) Use in a virtualized environment. This license allows you to install only one instance of the software for use on one device, whether that device is physical or virtual. If you want to use the software on more than one virtual device, you must obtain a separate license for each instance.

Microsoft considers the virtual machine to be a second computer. If you have a full retail version of Windows 10, you can transfer the license from the host (bare metal) computer to the virtual machine. But if you want to easily switch between the Windows 10 running on the host computer and Windows 10 in the VM, then you need to purchase a second license for Windows 10.

Activation when booting virtual *AND* bare metal