Win 10 not activated -clean install after upgrade

[SamA727]

Upgraded grand-daughter's pc from 7 to 10. Seemed a bit sluggish running from a spinning HDD so I decided to do a clean install to a SSD using the same USB I had made to upgrade with. Installed just fine but now says the keys don't match and I have to buy a key? Thought the upgrade was tied to your hardware (motherboard/CPU) and a clean install after would be activated?

Sam

 

[Trouble]

Thought the upgrade was tied to your hardware (motherboard/CPU) and a clean install after would be activated?

Absolutely 100% correct.
As long as the previous install had been effectively "Activated" on that machine and you are performing the same version and bit architecture install as was previously present on the old spinner.
You should be able to simply skip / do this later.... all prompts during the install for a product key and when it is up and running and you're signed on with your previous MS Account (not really necessary) you should be good to go.
As a matter of fact you should absolutely avoid any attempts at entering anything you think is a product key for Windows 10 because no such thing actually exists unless you have made a retail or OEM purchase.
There was some time when the activation service servers were overwhelmed an the activation took a while.
And often any attempts you made through the activation wizard to change key or enter new key will just complicate the issue.

Basically
Upgrade
Confirm that the upgrade is activated
Clean Install
No keys..... don't enter anything, just use the links that say skip or do this later every time.

 

[MrMikeH]

Absolutely 100% correct.
As long as the previous install had been effectively "Activated" on that machine and you are performing the same version and bit architecture install as was previously present on the old spinner.
You should be able to simply skip / do this later.... all prompts during the install for a product key and when it is up and running and you're signed on with your previous MS Account (not really necessary) you should be good to go.
As a matter of fact you should absolutely avoid any attempts at entering anything you think is a product key for Windows 10 because no such thing actually exists unless you have made a retail or OEM purchase.
There was some time when the activation service servers were overwhelmed an the activation took a while.
And often any attempts you made through the activation wizard to change key or enter new key will just complicate the issue.

Basically
Upgrade
Confirm that the upgrade is activated
Clean Install
No keys..... don't enter anything, just use the links that say skip or do this later every time.

I am in the same boat, except I am just moving from one SSD to another in the same machine. Windows won't activate and and indicates I need to buy a new key. Could it be that I have to remove the old hard drive first or is there really a restriction on changing drives. I hope not, that would be very restricting in the future.

 

[Trouble]

If you are simply moving from one SSD to another why not just image the old ssd and write the image to the new ssd.
As far as needing to remove the old ssd first, IDK, seems like a likely step.
Otherwise you might end up corrupting the Windows Boot Manager on the old drive, as it would be the one marked as active and likely receive the boot config.

 

[SamA727]

Well after a couple of days I just clean installed it again and it activated this time so I don't know.

Sam