Windows 11 Pro activation fails indicting hardware changed
Receive unable to activate windows - looks like hardware on this device has changed My old laptop was dying. Proactively purchased a win 11 pro license through my company benefits site since I knew my current system would have to be replaced. Purchased a new laptop with Win 11 Home. Changed to local account for login and uninstalled some bloatware. Attempted to upgrade to Pro and receivied the unable to activate due to hardware changes. This is an out of the box laptop, no hardare changes have been made. I tried using the generic key and the change to the new license fix posted on this site and still get the same activation error. I now have an unactivated Windows 11 Pro on the system. I logged into my MS account and checked licensed devices under Microsoft Account - Devices Strangely, it no longer lists my old HP laptop which was a win 11 pro. Just the new ASUS laptop. I had hopes to replace a few motherboard solder points and revice the old HP system for a grandchild. Concerned now that the HP system is missing that i will encounter licensing issues for it as well once it is revived. Additonal point, not sure if it matters, but I did use the same device name for the new laptop that i had on the old one Thanks, Kent EngleTwo default Windows 11 features could be making your PC performance slow
Many Windows 11 users experience slow PC performance due to certain default features that consume system resources without clear benefit. Two common culprits are the Windows Search indexing service, which runs constantly in the background and can use significant CPU and disk activity, and the Superfetch or SysMain service, which preloads frequently used apps into memory, potentially causing delays and lag on systems with limited resources. Disabling or adjusting these features has helped some users improve their system responsiveness, especially on older or less powerful hardware. If you're noticing slow startup times, lagging applications, or overall sluggishness, these background services might be contributing to the issue. Turning them off or customizing their settings could provide a noticeable performance boost, but it’s important to weigh the impact on system functionality like search speed and app preloading before making changes.Windows update active hours constraint
I’m trying to avoid my machine rebooting while I am not around to exercise a modicum of control. In my Windows Update settings I have disabled “get the latest updates as soon as they’re available” and I have “pause updates” set to 1 week. In the advanced settings I have disabled “get me up to date”, and I have enabled “Notify me when a restart is required”. Today I sat down to my PC to discover that it had terminated all my running programs and rebooted. Without any kind of prompt or warning. Which brings me to “Active Hours”. Active hours can be set automatically or manually and I thought I could set them to 00:00 to 23:59 to prevent updates running without me being around. But no, Microsoft absolutely prevents the active hours from covering a period longer than 18 hours. Why??? So far as I can tell, I have done everything available in the settings to prevent what nevertheless happened at some point in the last 24 hours. I am not aware of an urgent zero-day security problem that demanded an instant patch. Why did my machine do a forced restart when so far as I can tell I have clearly insisted that it not do so? I must be missing something! Any suggestions?
Windows 11 install from iso can't get past adding Microsoft account
I'm desperate, thought I had researched enough how to sort my windows 11 install. My laptop told me I could upgrade plenty of times, windows healcheck tells me it's compatible. I decided I should do a clean install and foolishly on a summary from online search it said I could do this my reseting my pc - I did this but in reinstalled windows 10 and then despite running updates multiple times gave me no options for upgrade to windows 11, despite the system is eligible... so I try installing from and iso virtual mount... takes forever, but it looks like I've succeeded until I need to add microsoft account... Then I try this and it says success you've proved you're human and then it just hangs... nothing happens... HELP!!!
Windows 10 Commercial ESU - Unsure if it's working
Hi! Our organization has purchased Windows 10 Commericla ESU licenses for a handful of computers that we do not wish to update to Windows 11. I have applied the licenses following the steps outlined in this document: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/whats-new/enable-extended-security-updates#install-and-activate-the-esu-key I ran the verification command (slmgr.vbs /dlv) and confirmed that the command indicates that this computer has installed Year 1 of Commercial ESU. However, I still see "Your version of Windows has reached the end of support" when I navigate to Settings/Update & Security/Windows Update. Is this just a visual bug, or is this an indication that I have not properly enrolled this computer into Commercial ESU. So far, both computers I have tested this on are showing the same behavior. Thank you in advance.
Upgrade to windows 11 Pro from unlicensed Home version
Hi I have build a computer and I downloaded unlicensed Windows 11 Home to a usb drive (from microsoft) and installed it as operative system. Then my manager bought a 11 pro license key (misunderstood each other) instead of windows 11 home license key. Now I try to write in the 11 pro license key but it doesn't work. I get an error message when I push next. I thought it would upgrade to pro automatically. So my question is: does this not work? what should I do? I don't want to reformat the computer since I have bought office package and another program.upgrade - keep ALL - the Windows 22H2 to Windows 25H2, by running from Windows 10, the setup.exe
Can upgrade - keep ALL - the Windows 10 Pro 22H2 to Windows 11 Pro 25H2, by inserting USB Stick installation media of 25H2 and run from Windows 10 Pro 22H2 File Manager the setup.exe file as Admin,...? Or, Not, is needed to boot from USB Stick installation media of 25H2...?
Purchased upgrade from Home to Pro through MS Store - No confirmation, can't install
Hi All As per the title, I bought an upgrade for Win 11 Home > Pro from the MS Store earlier today. I've not received any form of confirmation email, but the purchase is showing in my account. However, I can't find a way to actually execute the upgrade. Can anyone provide any insight on how to sort this one out? Thanks in advance!
