Long story short, bought this Acer ES 15 laptop 2 weeks ago. I come back from a xmas party and my 15yrold son says "i got you win 10 pro on your laptop"............ I've restarted, reset, back to factory settings (supposedly) now I still have an inactivated windows 10 pro......... How do I find my original windows key that came with the computer that gave me win 10 home. looked in the box, manuals and no luck I contacted Acer "we don't keep track of the keys that were installed in new systems". Help
Showkey Plus Showkey - Windows 10 blog Tomcat....Long story short, bought this Acer ES 15 laptop 2 weeks ago. I come back from a xmas party and my 15yrold son says "i got you win 10 pro on your laptop"............ I've restarted, reset, back to factory settings (supposedly) now I still have an inactivated windows 10 pro......... How do I find my original windows key that came with the computer that gave me win 10 home. looked in the box, manuals and no luck I contacted Acer "we don't keep track of the keys that were installed in new systems". Help
The original key is on the COA sticker. That is on the bottom of the laptop or inside the battery compartment.
Awesome, f14tomcat. Just what I've been looking for!
whs. I tore the bottom off the laptop, looked thru all the paperwork and there is no COA. I've been in panic mode for the 3 days not being able to find the original key.
This is how a COA sticker looks like. No PC with Windows can be sold without a COA sticker - that is illegal. I wonder what happened to your sticker.
WHS, not to be argumentative, honest, but I bought a Surface Pro 3 from MS about a year ago, pre-installed 8.1, and there is no COA sticker. Anywhere. Maybe lappys are an exception, I don't know.This is how a COA sticker looks like. No PC with Windows can be sold without a COA sticker - that is illegal. I wonder what happened to your sticker.
EDIT: Just scoured all over the case of my desktop. Bought a new Dell 3847 in May, 2015. No Coa sticker. Only thing in common is they both have UEFI and keys are stored there. Dunno.....
If worse comes to worse if you reinstall windows 10 Home once you connect to the net your machine will be validated from Microsoft, As long as it is the same motherboardOEMPCs store and encrypt the product key in the UEFI firmware chip. The product key is no longer on a COA sticker to help prevent theft. When you reset or install Windows 10, the product key will automatically be detected from the UEFI firmware chip, and will be used to activate.
Product Key - View in Windows 10 Brink windowssh blog
If they are UEFI, then you do not need a sticker.
deleted.
