My Windows 10 upgrade journey thus far...
My Windows 10 upgrade journey thus far...
Sure thing! Here’s a rephrased version of your message:
Yeah, I got free Windows 10! I have three eligible devices ready for the upgrade—one with Windows 7, two with Windows 8.1. My laptop is running native Windows 7, and it was upgraded to Windows 10 through the "Get Windows 10" app. The installation went smoothly at 100%, moved to a fresh Windows 10 desktop after the upgrade, and I cleaned it up using the media creation tool. Everything finished as planned.
On my HTPC, I’m a native Windows 8.1 machine. I tried to upgrade via the same app, downloaded the update, and verified it. I was prompted to restart, which worked—though I got a black screen briefly before booting back onto Windows 8.1. The update kept failing with error code 80240020, so I didn’t try manual updates. I’m holding off on the upgrade for now, hoping it goes smoothly.
I’m curious how others are doing. Did anyone else’s Windows 7 upgrade go well? Is this a coincidence that my Windows 8.1 setups are having trouble?
Keep going with your updates, buddy! So far the gaming rig has performed well. It crashed once with a black screen lasting about 30 minutes, but restarting fixed it. The second crash was smooth. Currently, the main issue is having drivers still set to 8.1 since newer ones aren’t available yet.
I upgraded both computers and they both ran Windows 7 successfully for the first couple of days. After the third day, Cortana, the task bar, and the start button stopped working. A window appeared in the middle of the screen, forcing me to restart repeatedly. It turned out to be a known issue in Windows 10. I had to reinstall Windows 7 on the second computer before the clean install. After upgrading, I tried a clean installation using the tool provided by Windows 10. Eventually, the computer wouldn’t boot properly, showing a blue screen and saying the boot drive was inaccessible. I searched online and found that the only fix was to reinstall it via USB. So I decided to revert back to Windows 7 instead of continuing with the upgrade. In the end, my experience with the Windows 10 upgrade was frustrating.
Updated Gaming Rig - After spotting numerous failed Windows 10 updates in the history, I downloaded the media creation tool and selected the "Upgrade this PC now" option. The upgrade completed successfully at 100%. Restarted into Windows 10 and confirmed the system was genuine. I booted from a USB drive to install fresh Windows 10, which also succeeded fully. Checked system info again and saw an activation error where the product key should appear. Assumed servers were overloaded, installed drivers, rechecked activation, but the message persisted. I restarted multiple times, tried troubleshooting steps, but the issue remained. Eventually, I decided to reinstall Windows 8.1 since the process was exhausting. Anyone who has started fresh knows how long it can take with large file backups. This ordeal has worn me down—now I’m leaning toward buying a new license and skipping the free upgrade. For now, I’ll stick with Windows 8.1, but the urge to have Windows 10 is strong.
This afternoon I considered restarting the Windows 10 installation... Gaming Rig - started the upgrade with the "Get Windows 10" desktop app. The upgrade completed successfully at 100%. I booted into Windows 10 desktop, reviewed the system info page and confirmed an authentic version was running. I powered off the PC and restarted from the USB drive to perform a fresh installation. The new install also succeeded at 100%, and I resumed on Windows 10 desktop. On checking the system info again, I saw an activation error asking for a product key where it normally would appear. I thought "this is happening again." I chose the "chat with a Microsoft agent" option (I’m not sure where I found that link—I clicked near the error code which opened a webpage, then selected start chat). After confirming my issue with a tech support representative, they provided me with a genuine Windows 10 product key without any questions. Now my PC is running a clean Windows 10 install, and I have a valid product key, so I won’t have to worry about hardware changes or future reinstalls. If anyone faces activation issues after an upgrade or wants a fresh install later, they can reach out to Microsoft support—they might supply a real key as well.