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Windows 8 sticker but no product key in UEFI on refurbished laptop
I'm posting this on TenForums so others will learn from my experience upgrading to Windows 10. But I would really like to know if anyone else has seen a computer with the square Windows 8 sticker, but no product key either on a label or in firmware/bios? <- that's just bolded because that is the main question I have
I purchased a manufacturer refurbished ASUS X750JA laptop on ebay. It has the official Windows 8 little square sticker on the back, which to me indicates it should have a Windows 8 product key stored in UEFI firmware. It came with 2x 1TB hard drives. I didn't want to mess with Windows 8 or 8.1 at all, so I booted the laptop and it came up with the OOBE Windows 8.1 screen as expected. I entered audit mode and exported the drivers to a USB flash drive, then shut it down.
I pulled out the primary HDD and installed a completely blank SSD and clean installed Windows 10 Home. Created a local user account, and Windows 10 was not activated! *raise one eyebrow here* Ran showkey plus and no product key in UEFI/bios. So I connected the HDD to a USB adapter (which is why I did not bother making a back up image first - because I have lots of other means of making a backup image from the removed HDD). Looked at the software registry hive with showkey plus and it showed an OEM Windows 8 Home product key. Changed the Windows 10 product key and entered the Windows 8 product key and it activated just like it should.
If something had happened to that Windows 8 installation on that hard drive, though, without retrieving the product key, I would have been up the creek. I thought that if the Windows 8 was installed by the manufacturer that the product key either had to be stored in UEFI/bios or printed on a COA sticker?