What contractual terms apply to my Windows 10 installation?

Hi. I've just bought a DELL M6400 laptop. It's a nice piece of kit. Now, after I got it, and switched it on, although it was showing as activated the blurb said the license would expire on 28th September 2019. Anyway, I Googled the issue and ended up opening up an elevated Command Prompt and typing in "slmgr /rearm". Now, there is no message saying the license is to expire on a certain date.

I happened to notice that Windows Defender had quaranteened / deleted something. It said "HackTool: Win32/AutoKMS."

The laptop probably came from a business. And that may have a bearing.

What I want to know is on what basis am I being allowed to use the OS. I believe I have a KMS Client Setiup Key, as the the final characters are T83GX. Basically, I'm worried that at some point I'll have to pay in order to keep using the OS. Could someone please address this? Thank you. Rich

richard2277 said:

Hi. I've just bought a DELL M6400 laptop... ...I happened to notice that Windows Defender had quaranteened / deleted something. It said "HackTool: Win32/AutoKMS." The laptop probably came from a business. And that may have a bearing....

Your suspicions sound correct. The ****T83GX key is the generic key for W10 Pro with KMS activation. That confirms it was used as a business machine and most likely had a corporate windows image installed. This would only remain activated if it could contact the company KMS server. The hack Defender quarantined was an illegal measure the seller used to keep it activated. The bad news is you have no rights to continue using it. A business cannot 'sell on' a KMS licence.

What I want to know is on what basis am I being allowed to use the OS.....

The 'rearm' probably use the piracy KMS hack before Defender removed it. I'm afraid that you are using the system illegally.



However, there may be some good news too. Enter your service tag on the Dell support site and click the 'View system configuration' link. This will tell you exactly what OS this particular machine was supplied with.

https://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04?app=products


If it was supplied with Windows 8 or Windows 10 then you are in luck. Embedded in the bios will be a W8/10 key. You can check that it does with ShowKeyPlus.

ShowKeyPlus

If so, then you have a legal entitlement to install the version (probably Pro) that the embedded key is for. A clean install of Windows 10 will read the key from the bios, using it to choose the edition (Home or Pro) and to activate it (a Win 8 key will activate Windows 10).

If you don't have a key in the bios, then I'm afraid you'll have to buy one.

It's a pirate copy Kms is used by corporate vl clients and must be activated every couple of months. It won't activate from ms with the present key if you bought it get onto eBay or seller saying you want a legal copy or you will report them

Superfly said:

Edit: Ninja'd by Bree .. LOL

Well, at least I did point out how useful ShowKey is ... LOL

Superfly said:

Yup you certainly did - however, see my edit...

Well, the Dell service tag will let the OP find out exactly what OS it was sold with. There are drivers available for Win7, so if it's a late model there's an outside chance it has a W7 CoA key (if it's still legible ). That could be used to install W10.

Looks like the OP will probably have to buy W10 though.

Hi. When I run ShowkeyPlus it gives me the Product ID and the Installed Key, which ends in - T83GX. That's a KMS key. Anyway I noticed the file Windows.old and then used ShowkeyPlus(Retrieve key from backup) to open the file called "SOFTWARE" That returned the string of a key with the same final characters (T83GX). As for OEM key, I get "Windows 7 OEM marker is present in firmware". I wonder if that might be helpful. Rich

EDIT: Is there significance in the KMS key also being found in in Windows.old?