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Interesting reading. Thanks.
Here are a few more answers to some nagging questions about Windows 10 upgrades and activation in the post-Anniversary-Update era.
Phasing out the year-long free Windows 10 upgrade promotion is, no doubt, a complicated process. But getting answers about how this process would work has proven equally complicated for some reason.
Thanks to a new report from Thurrott.com's Paul Thurrott, we now have more answers to some of the nagging Windows 10 upgrade and activation questions that readers have been asking during recent weeks and months.Thurrott says he's seen some new internal Microsoft documentation that explains how the end of the Windows 10 free-year upgrade deal, which officially ended on July 29, was designed to work.
In that documentation, Microsoft officials acknowledged that there would be "a short period" when existing Windows 7 and 8 product keys would continue to work for activating Windows 10, as some of us discovered to be the case last week. Seemingly, this was by design, as Microsoft officials realized some users might not have managed to get Windows 10 fully set up and installed by July 29...
Read more: Windows 10: More free upgrade and activation questions answered | ZDNet
See also: Your Windows 10 Activation Questions, Answered - Thurrott.com
From:
Your Windows 10 Activation Questions, Answered - Thurrott.com
We see:
"Can I activate my free Windows 10 upgrade after the July 29 cut-off date?
Yep. Assuming you downloaded the Anniversary Update download before August 1, you can start and finish Setup, and activate successfully, at any time in the future.
“If the download finishes and they are in the install phase, the install will finish and they will in fact be activated and be just fine,” the documentation notes. “The deadline cuts off the download only.”
This indicates that the download available to Insiders (the one I saved) is in some way different from the upgrade offered for general release after August 2nd - is this so?
I'm guessing that's an error - if it said "downloaded the Windows 10 Upgrade before 1 August" (or 30 July, but maybe the weekend didn't count) it would make a whole lot more sense.
But it also suggests that there will be a perpetual way to upgrade, and I also wonder if the gatherosstate tool method will continue to work because I assume that's related.
It seems to depend on the 1607 update available to Insiders on 20th July (available for download before 01 August 2016) being subtly different to the 1607 update available to all users after 02 August 2016. and the truth of Thurrot's statement.
What the anniversary update is is the latest of the Redstone 1 builds. Several RS1 Insider Preview builds also qualify as permanent activation with the August 2nd 14393.10 being the general RTM type release of same. If you already saw 10 activated before/by the July 29th deadline the Redstone 1 Anniversary build simply becomes as easy as previous versions saw service packs applied and retain the activation status. The hardware profile of the system was already recorded into the MS Activation data base.
The Anniversary update didn't even arrive on any pc here first being the main where the Get insider builds option was canceled for the 385 buiild while the second testing system still sees that option enabled. A 3rd desktop previously upgraded from 7 HP x64 to 10 Home as well as recently brand new 10 laptop never saw it either. I had to manually mount the iso downloaded by way of MC Tool to manually start the upgrade to update process.
The Insider Preview builds are far from over with however. Within the next few weeks perhaps the next build will be announced when the next developer build which is mostly what those are is ready for testing updates to come on.
Be aware of one odd issue being seen for some with a new error about Insider settings needing attention following the Redstone 1 Anniversary update going on. Suddenly this one has been surfacing not only on a thread here but at the MS discussion sites as well.