Windows activation is also surprisingly chill about what counts as "the same computer" when the license is synced to your MS account. Why yes, my gaming rig is in fact just upgraded from the $100 chinese tablet I bought a decade ago. Same machine, ship of theseus, and all that....
Im sitting here on a rig that started as a windows 7 office pc on a i5 2500, kept upgrading. now in a full tower with 5800x3d and windows 11. Big plus that office pc came with the pro license. paid 100 bucks originally
Here in the EU, buying a OEM license as a consumer is totally 100% legal. Shops forcing you to buy it together with a piece of hardware, is considered "product tying", which ranges from grey area to downright illegal. Calling Microsoft for customer support though? I mean seriously, who does that anyway.
It is specifically against the written terms of use for the product and is therefore not licensed unless purchased with qualifying hardware. Same as businesses buying student retail licenses back in the day.
@@doctor_gee Some things in written terms are illegal and are automatically void in the eu. Buying and selling an oem license without hardware is legal in the eu. And using the same license on another pc, after uninstalling it from the 1st pc, is also legal.
fun fact: if you use MAS HWID activation, you actually have an "officially" licensed version of windows. when you use it, you can even totally wipe your system and reinstall windows fresh and it will recognize that you have a license even without rerunning the script. your system actually gets some of its hardware info registered in microsoft's system, where it recognizes it as good as gold licensed
If you distrust MAS, all you have to do is remember that OEM keys are tied to the motherboard, which means that you can just reinstall Windows and it will stay activated, even if you never ran MAS on that install.
@@jarritooinstall win, run mas, install fresh win (not as upgrade but from a USB so it's completely "fresh") and it will stay activated. As long as you're using the Ms account, I suppose, since it's tired to it, though; knowledgeable people, correct me if I'm wrong
I can't believe people are still using that, I never used it myself but I only hear bad things about it. I also don't think I ever heard a single good thing about it, just use Davinci Resolve already people! It's free and very good. And best of all, it doesn't crash! I know what a groundbreaking technology.
And this plus the insane subscription fees and even more insane cancellation fees are why I use Davinci Resolve for video NLE instead of Adobe anything.
My comment will probably drown in the flood of comments, but this video has sooo many awesome elements. The visuals right from the start, the animations that give Windows 11 it's own kinda 'character' (0:20) , the crashing Adobe Premier (1:16), how you bought a french version of Windows 11 and kinda ran with the joke (2:02), the transition to a small ad for the LTT store (5:28), how you started and dealt with the subject of piracy (7:28), the visuals for _Bang for your buck_ even it was never said (8:55), the integration of the sponsor segway into the story (11:44) and even suggested Linux without speaking down from the high software horse of moral superiority. So a big applause to Jordan for writing it (I guess that many of the spoken content comes from the writer), Kendrick as editor (I guess editor = video cutter) and all the other people (eg.: is Alfred to praise for the visuals as well as _Art director_ ?) who made this video such a joy to watch 😁
Same here but also shhhhh don’t want it to get taken down (doubt it will tho because it’s hosted on GitHub literally a Microsoft subsidiary and they def would have had to know about it by now with how popular it is)
Hi. French resident here. In France (the one in Europe with Paris), the Windows boxes laying on the shelves read "Windows Home" or "Windows Familly". Quebec is more die-hard about the French language than France is. e.g : for car parks, road signs read "Parking" while Quebec talks about "parc de stationnement". Don't get me started on how Holywood movies titles are translated over-there. Love.
"(the one in Europe with Paris)" lol I wasn't aware there was another France. 🤣 Everything else you said is true though. French resident here too btw. ✌
I LOVE my french-quebec movie titles; don't even try to take them away from me! Some here mostly refer to them by their english titles anyways (for US titles that is), just like we do plants with their latin names.
To comment on that about ISO hacks: One thing you can do is add an autounattend.xml file, which is an officially supported feature by MS. You can either add it to the installation USB or ISO (if you use VMs, more complex though), this executes commands during the installation and is intended for mass deployment of windows. It only executes the command found in the autounattend.xml file, so you can go through it if you're uncomfortable with it. This is normally meant for mass-deployments, but it works on all windows types. You should make a video on this, it's an extremely useful feature in many ways. It's a safe way to de-bloat a fresh install of windows as it is being installed.
Meh, easier ways to do that than making an autounattend file lol, that's some oldschool shiz. Just run powershell and remove-appxpackage -allusers on every single package, or hell... run a "Fresh Start" (but the former even removes all MS apps, including telem apps). Kinda funny how the consumer level always uses real old techniques.
@@oourdumb why should i use powershell and waste my time if i could let windows completely install itself without any user input + Its debloated without doing anything? There is literally CTT's tool so you dont even have to create your own autounattend.xml
@@oourdumb True, you can do that. But it's gonna be a pain to have to do that on more than one machine. However with autounattend you can also use powershell to set all the flags stop the websearching etc. to per-configure all the stuff you want gone. Since you can run powershell during the install process it also allows for more bypasses of the hardware requirement, although we'll have to see how strict MS is with that. There are plenty of guides out there with premade autounattend that de-bloats it completely (then you can use win-get to install firefox or brave)
For anyone interested, Greg Salazar already did a video on installing debloaded windows by creating this autounattend.xml file through a fairly intuitive software, well worth a watch. Gonna follow his tutorial as soon as I build my dedicated plex server, I only need windows to serve as a vesel for plex and nothing else. ua-cam.com/video/fl73Py1L-DY/v-deo.htmlsi=IS6yyVVuFl2KzDsj
Coming from an ex employee of Microsoft, those keys that you get for cheap on sites like the ones mentioned the vid, it is very likely that they are a "volume" license, which is perfectly fine if you don't plan on changing your motherboard at all, but if you do decide to upgrade your mobo and use the volume key, it will not activate, abd if you try and contact support, they will only tell you to go back to where you bought the license and ask them for a refund.
I changed my motherboard and license didn't activate after that. I called to the support, there were a robot which asked if I had changed my hardware. It told me to press 1 if yes. I pressed 1 and after that my license started working.
@@jauho7483 Unless you change your motherboard every couple months, a volume-license key for 10 bucks is still a really good deal though. I wouldn't necessarily use those for important machines where I lose money if my computer is down for a couple days, but other than that - why not?
I mean you get these licenses for like 11 to 12 euros, so if you're buying a new motherboard (which will likely come with other shit too) you can afford that.
@@ilzuab8467 there's no concrete answer to what change to the hardware would deactivate Windows or not. It's kinda unreliable if you can't reactivate from the same key. But it's not like having a legit copy of Windows add any bonus value to the setup anyway so it's hard to say if that's a negative or not.
Fun fact: I have never paid for a Windows License, and I don’t pirate it. If you upgrade old windows 7 computers (which are really cheap and easy to find) to windows 10 or 11, you can link the license to your Microsoft account. When you get a new computer, you can transfer that license to your new computer; fully activating the pc. Obviously you’re still technically paying for a license, but there are cases where you can find Grandma’s dusty old pc in her attic and get a free license out of it. Edit: this isn’t putting a win7 code into a windows 10 machine, it consists of going to the activation section in the windows settings and hitting the “I changed hardware” button. From there, you can choose the device from your Microsoft account thay you want to transfer the license from.
MS doesn’t care about „pirating“ Windows. That‘s why they let you use it without activation. They make way more money from people that don‘t buy Windows but use MS Office and OneDrive - all that they would potentially lose by people not wanting to pay and go for Apple instead.
Linus will ruin all good methods like he did when he tried to upload 1PB to Google Drive, which was great before he had to make a video and destroy it.
Side note that the Microsoft activation scripts thingy also lets you optionally get a permanent office 365 sub (word, office, excel, etc) fkn amazing. Best vid on the channel hands down
In Germany (and I think all over the EU) you can get OEM Windows for 10€, just because the whole "bound to one device" is not allowed here, legally. Meaning OEM keys can be reused and became dirt-cheap. You can then log into Windows with a Microsoft account, bind the OEM key to your account and as long as you stay living in the EU, you can use that same Microsoft account on an unlimited amount of PCs to activate Windows, basically.
so microsoft were doing something they shouldn't have when the capacitors on my motherboard failed and they forced me to switch to linux? (actually i went back to using windows 7 and being happy about having a nice stable os, then i switched to linux instead of going back when software support stared disappearing, but who cares.)
Are you sure those are actual OEM/system builder keys, because 10€ sounds a lot like the grey-market volume-licence keys you can get on the web. While not really illegal, those volume-license keys are not meant for resale and they could theoretically be deactivated at any moment in time. I wouldn't care if it's just a gaming machine, but I wouldn't install them on a more important pc. OEM/system builder licenses on the other hand are completely legit and not bound to any volume license. I just don't think you can get them for 10 €
Same down here in the South Pacific (Aus & NZ). In fact, you can do the same with MS Office. Never had an issue. Another loophole is if you own a 'name brand' PC - Hp, Dell etc no need to buy a key. They are stored in the BIOS.
I know that this will be seen by literally no one but, if you use MAS and use a Microsoft account, the key MAS provides you will bind to the said Microsoft account, so it will basically permanently activate windows once and for all.
WAIT I NEVER THOUGHT OF THIS TILL NOW, IT ACTUALLY DOES HAHAHAHHA. i used MAS in the past and when i reinstalled windows i was never prompted to buy it or anything, i went to settings and it says "Windows is activated with a digital license linked to your microsoft account"
My current Windows 11 Pro key came from an education program partnered between my University's Computer Science department and Microsoft. It's technically a Windows 10 Pro Key, but while I was enrolled in a CS class I had access to the whole suite of software: A key for each of Windows 10 Home, Pro, Education, Server 2016, Server 2019, and even some other versions I don't recall. I've been graduated for years now, and even upgraded that Windows license to Windows 11 and moved it to a new computer and it still works like a regular old retail copy of Windows.
I think I still have access to some of those programs. I took a few IT courses at a community college and one of the perks that I discovered was access to a bunch of MS software. I don't think they really ever told us about it. Even though I haven't attended in over 5 years, I was still able to log in to that MS page, but they made it a bit more difficult to get the software. They're really pushing for MS Azure.
Every copy of Windows 11 for every computer that me or my immediate family own can be traced back to 2 Windows 7 Pro license keys that I obtained for free from college over a decade ago lol.
Same. I got a Windows 8.1 Pro license from UC San Diego so many years ago. With every subsequent build, I've expected it to stop working and been totally willing to pay for a license. But they keep accepting it on the newest versions. Pro also has other benefits (as far as I can tell). I've never once seen a prompt that forces me to reboot to update. I've seen the memes, but never in practice. But I shut down and reboot often, so that could also be it. I still get the other annoyances though, like ads and (dismissable) full screen prompts to set up phone sync, passcode, whatever. I don't think I've seen automatically installed apps like Candy Crush, but maybe I don't pay enough attention to anything outside the games I play on this machine.
I have the same, my brother and a few of his friends still run on my Win 10 Pro/Home keys I got from my college through Microsoft education. I also had a windows Server 2008, 2012 & Server 2016 licenses incase I needed them with the 2008r2 running 24x7 from around 2014-2018 and I'm sure if I had supported hardware now it would be today too.
I doubt Microsoft really cares if consumers pay for windows, it’s a similar story to winrar where they make more money from the copies they sell to businesses who will not only pay the sticker price for every machine they need but keep doing so to avoid opening them selves to lawsuits
100%. They make their money on legitimate OEMs and businesses who can't afford to pirate Windows. The odd pirate who can't be bothered to pay for Windows and would never pay regardless, well it helps their market share to keep them on Windows instead of them going onto Linux or god forbid, Macintosh
This is part of why MS is using Windows more and more as an ad delivery tool with a side hustle as a desktop OS - there's a lot more money in ongoing ad revenue than in one-time OS purchases, and the ad revenue can subsidize the unpaid OS installs.
@@cocomonkilla I don't get where all of you got the "spyware" and "ads" bs from. Sounds like it's an american or bloatware problem honestly, I've never received any ads, nor do I have any weird ram usage - I also don't have any "weird" traffic that some people proclaim, to be precise I got 0 traffic as soon as I disable the weather forecast feature (which doubles with the news system, whyever they got a news system but I've seen people use it so I guess it was requested).
It absolutely is. The sharks of Reddit have necessitated content that often ends up being simply a 10-30 minute disclaimer, in order to keep the whiny babies who can't understand nuance at bay. Because God forbid a video not have Every. Single. detail about a thing.
@@helljumper912 Well not really having every single detail necessarily but pointing out every single more than semi obvious nuance. It can definitely get annoying but you understand why they have to do it. It's the Achilles heel of having a huge audience.
@@SegFaultOnLine1984 Agreed! I think it's nice that they are thorough; it may add 10 to 20 extra seconds to the vid, but you probably reduce down-votes and comments that don't add value (or complain) by orders of magnitude. I've also been pleasantly surprised with their LTT labs page as well as their Floatplane vids. Their reports also link to explainers filled with very clear details about what each chart shows.
It’s been hosted on GitHub for over a year. If you didn’t know, Microsoft owns GitHub. If they had an issue with it, they would have booted it ages ago.
I got a Windows 8 Student key from my university in Brazil back in 2009, graduated in 2014 and still using the same license until now with Windows 11 PRO after 3 new builds.
I'm pretty sure Yvons keywords that flags a suspicious transactions are: "Friends" "Not Family Friends, "Friends" " "MY friend not Yvons!" "I'm Linus from LinusTechTips, no! not Linux, Linus, wait noooo please!" "Jake u up?"
2:07 - You can also use a trash-email, or your microsoft account and misstype a password multiple times. It will note that you're account is blocked due to many password trys and u can opt to reset it. Pressing reset password just throws you into creating a local account. This command-line command however is way more handy.
I just installed Windows 11 on a system a few days ago, latest ISO from MS. Didn’t disconnect from the internet, use the command prompt, or any of the tricks. The part where it asked if it’s personal or work/school use I chose the latter. I didn’t make connect to a domain or anything, just prompted me to set up a local account. I figure when you select that option it searches the network for the domain or whatever and when it doesn’t find it just dumps you into a local account so you could set it up later.
Місяць тому+1540
Not activating windows isnt piracy, I don't know why people keep freaking out about it. Microsoft literally gives you the option to do it 😂
Microsoft can audit companies and fine them for unactivated instances in use, but they definitely don’t care about home users, lol. And usually just larger companies. I worked at one where we got fined a few thousand dollars for a server and some workstations not having valid licenses
@Henry-sv3wv You can enable dark mode (and change just about every other setting greyed out in the Settings app) by tweaking the registry. There are guides online. I used to do that until I discovered MAS
6:43 I'm just now learning there's a dark mode for Windows (Which in hindsight...should've been obvious) My life has been transformed. I will no longer flashbang myself every time I open something 😭 Its beautiful
Wow. Once it came to Windows I found a way to update Windows just so I could finally use it. Was so tired of light mode burning my eye balls Going back to no dark mode for windows and every other program in Windows feels like going back to the Stone Age of computing.
About 8 or 9 years ago the company I worked for did a PC refresh and I sent all of the PCs off to recycling to be destroyed. The PCs all had Windows 7 Pro key stickers on them, but those codes were never used since we had a KMS server. Before shipping them off to recycling I took pictures of all the Windows 7 Pro stickers and till this day they will still activate a fresh Windows 10 or 11 Pro install. I've given probably 200 - 300 away and still have almost 300 left. I can understand them working for Windows 10 but it blew my mind when I tried one on Windows 11 for the first time and it actually worked. Out of curiosity, I tried using a Windows 7 Pro key from a random laptop I had laying around and it didn't work, so I have no explanation for what is special about these specific Windows 7 Pro keys but I'm not going to complain about it.
One thing I ran into with these 3rd party websites is sellers selling keys that have been used multiple times. If they tell you to call Microsoft as part of installing the key, you have been sold a key that is on multiple computers and will probably be banned at some point in the future.
Thank you LTT, such perfect timing for this video. Yesterday, I turned on my Windows 10 Pro PC to find the "Activate Windows" watermark. The problem is that my PC has been activated since at least 2017. I've performed major hardware upgrades along the way (Intel -> AMD), but that was well over 2 years ago. There must have been a recent Windows update that killed my activation. Trying to get my PC activated the right way didn't work, so thank you for telling me about Microsoft Activation Scripts... it worked like a charm :)
When you use the Option, "I don't have a Key", my Tips are, install without Internet Connection, then Configure everything (because without Internet, the Personalization Option is not Greyed out), like Dark Mode etc. and only then Connect to the Internet (maybe make a Backup of the System before you Connect to the Internet) Sorry for my English, not my First Language
Seeing how you use capital letters, are you German? I'm just not into another languages and German is the only one I know that uses that much of those.
You can't install without internet unless you run a command during OOBE, and even then the personalization stuff kicks in as soon as you do. You'd have to go to lengths to block all comms to MS servers, which change often.
You can also install Win10, activate with MAS and then upgrade to Win11 and your MAS License will convert to an official one and will link to your microsoft account
I did this with Daz Loader on my laptop back in the day. Windows 7 would not activate despite the PC coming with a license. MS support told me someone stole my key and to ask Acer for a new one. I knew Acer wasn't going to help. (Long out of warranty) So I cracked it. When Windows 10 came out it upgraded to a legit Windows 10 license. I don't feel morally wrong because I rightfully owned a license for that PC.
When you activate Windows 10 via HWID you get a digital license, which you can link immediately to a Microsoft account, same goes on Windows 11. They utilize the same licensing system so it's completely unnecessary to install Windows 10 just to immediately upgrade to Windows 11.
For new Linux users, I mostly recommand "Linux Mint Cinnamon". If you want to think more about what to choose, first choose your desktop environment instead of directly looking for a distribution.
@@christopherdark4671 I know you aren't questioning me, but I will answer anyways for now of what I know, and someone else can add more to it if they want to. 1. Gaming on Linux has significantly gotten a lot better than it once used to be all thanks to Valve and with their Steam Deck and Proton. And truth to be told, even though gaming has gotten better on Linux, there are games WILL NOT work that are either single player or multiplayer that have anti-cheat, which is very unfortunate if you have any one of your favorite games that works on Windows, but will not on Linux. If you ever think about switching to Linux, I highly recommend using ProtonDB to check and see what game(s) will work and what will not to save yourself some money, headache and time from reading the reports from others and their experience. 2. Streaming wise, I am no streamer, but someone else can fill that it in. However, I do record my games footage with OBS, and it works good just as same as on Windows or Mac. 3. Editing, there are some plenty of good editing softwares just for simple and basic editing. From my experience, I've used KDenlive, its pretty good for what it is to make some "intermediate" level of editing with much more tools to work with. And if you want to use a "higher" level of editing software with MORE tools to work with than Kdenlive, then Davinci Resolve is your best bet, and its really good alternative software for either Adobe After Effects or Adobe Premiere. I hope this helps and answers your questions.
@@christopherdark4671 It handles it pretty good nowadays, but still has a big anti-cheat Problem, a lot of popular games wont work due to anticheat, editing can be a hit or miss, streaming with OBS is completly fine. But you really have to commit an you might get overwellemed at the beginning which hapenned to me. But overall im satisfied.
@@christopherdark4671 Not sure about streaming and editing. Game development as a rule is optimised for consoles. For PC there are porting issues and from what I understand people have to buy PC with better specs in order to play games at the same performance or even better. In-terms of software again when video game developers make games for gaming pc they work best on windows. Not always. Linux does run more efficiently in many instances but when you are playing a game on linux that was designed more for windows which was designed more for console you going to run into performance issues, game crashes, bugs etc and the pc will be working harder. Regardless of what performance tier your pc is it's not going to hit the same high fps as a windows os. BUT.... linux gaming has just improved leaps and bounds and it will get better I believe. It has become very nice to game with. But at the moment it won't get the same performance and it's not going to be as hassle free as playing on a windows OS or console.
I've been using the same Windows 7 license since my college days, upgraded to Windows 10. It's been almost 15 years since I graduated. I'm actually using two licenses from then for my other desktop. No issues even with reinstalls and multiple upgrades since then!
3:25 Here in Germany, OEM versions are free for sale and Microsoft is not allowed to bind it to your hardware, this was ruled many years ago by a court. It's also way cheaper and a pretty good way to save bucks and still get a perfectly and 100% legal Windows license, even for business use. Oh, and regarding MSDNAA licenses 10:43 ... I still use my Windows license from university, which I brought from Windows 7, to 8, to 8.1, to 10 and now to 11. 😅
Exactly. :) I bought a notebook with Windows 7 in 2009 or 2010. Since then I have had a digital license on my Microsoft account. This account is currently on both of my computers using windows 11 flawlessly. And as you say, Windows 8, 8.1 and 10 were also added in between. Liebe Grüße aus Bremen
*@LTT Team:* YES, PLEASE! MAKE A NEW LINUX CHALLENGE! I was interested in Linux for a long time and after your video(s) I searched for a distro and left Windows. Even though I had some heavy starting issues and growing pains because of which I was outraged more than once (why would you leave a Windows system that runs OKish?), I like Linux so much better that after my old laptop broke, I didn't even bother to look at Windows 11 that the new laptop came with. I have been using Linux for about 2.5 years now and I really want to thank you that you made the challenge as it gave me a big boost in confidence that it will may be a hard move at first, but will turn out at least as good as Windows.
*6:30** ‼️ PLEASE NOTE!* ‼️ This limitation only applies to the UWP settings app, not any other program or even the control panels. All you have to do is restore control panels functionality with a tool, and all those "unavailable" settings are right back.
@@_GhostMinerA softlock does not necessarily have to refer to being stuck in games, it can also be used in terms of, there's a soft lock on something, it's not a hard lock preventing you from doing something, it's a soft lock that prevents you from doing something, but there's an easy way around it.
Linux user here: slowly I’ve seen that the gatekeeping has slowly become a lot less of a thing unless you’ve been looking at older threads for issues that were patched out and the thread abandoned due to it.
I live in Germany and i bought a Windows 10 OEM Key for about 15€ back in the day, linked it to my Microsoft account and used it for all my PCs ever since.
I did the same with my included Windows 7 key from a used laptop I bought in 2012. Upgraded all the way to Windows 11 now and still not had to pay any money to Windows this entire time.
I was one of those weird outliers that did buy a full 140$ real Win11 license from Microsoft. I did it for the reason of the hassle free issue of upgrading from hardware to hardware (given that my Windows 10 key was originally my OEM ME->XP->7->8->10 key, I tend to keep machines rolling forward for a long time), and if I did need to call MS for some stupid activation reason, I knew I had a legit receipt for proof of ownership. Also I knew at some point in the near future I was going to need windows Pro, the ability to cleanly upgrade to it without additional hassle was also kind of worth it to my mind.
I've already gotten yelled at for using Manjaro and Mint... FYI: Mint is fine, but it's still missing the glorious Wayland support. Manjaro is pretty good as well, but KDE is a finicky weirdo, but man, Wayland is so buttery smooth... unless you play Guild Wars 2: it screen tears like a biatch unless you relog in X11. Then everything is fine... which is kind of why Mint is pretty darn good on that account: No wayland, no problems.
I quite like these short Linus solo videos. It shows UA-cam content doesn't need to be this big showy production. Good solid Tech Tips, straight from the big man himself. All 5'5" of him
About custom windows distros. In certain regions of the globe do exist a big communities of distro creating, and builders have a reputation and hash checking, so as long as you use only provided sources its pretty safe, cuz this was started with Windows XP era.
About that OEM Version, that’s how it is on your side of the atlantic. Here in Europe you can use and sell them as you want because it’s not allowed to bundle them to the fixed hardware.
Re: OEM License, you actually get it cheaper if you're getting it the way you're supposed to. The Amazon reseller is adding larger margins, NCIX or similar would still have a cheaper price.
Yes, but no also. For example Newegg sells OEM licenses directly (not a third party) and they also charge 120. You can find retailers though that are willing to take less of a margin, but not by a whole lot. Most of the grey market keys and ebay are people just running MAS and emailing the generated code.
@@MTGeomancer That last part is not really true. MAS generates a digital license, which is not like a product key. The activation info is stored on Microsoft's servers and is unique to your hardware and Windows edition. You can't just copy and paste it like you can with a product key. And the only way to move a digital license from one system to another is to first link it to a Microsoft account.
@@MTGeomancerNo, eBay is mostly Business licenses which are legal to resell in the EU and cheaper third world OEM licenses, which are also legal to resell in the EU
I bought a windows 10 professional product key for 5 dollars on Amazon (2020). And then I just did the free upgrade to Windows 11 in 2023 when I built a new PC. No issues.
In bangladesh most pc and laptops come with activated oem licence. Also they don't count the cost of the license. If it doesn't have oem you can buy oem codes with 5-20usd.
The full price of windows is almost as much as a month minimum wage in my country. Costs 1100 reais and the minimum monthly wage for 40 hours per week is 1412
I think regions like yours are where alternative operating systems like Linux or FreeBSD should have the most chance to grow. Too bad they're such bad options people would rather pirate Windows than use something free.
@@plebisMaximus In my case, I use an unnactivate version without problems. I don't care about changing the wallpaper, and the water mark doesn't bother me too much. For me, it's way better than linux.
One trick I recently discovered is that the Windows 11 upgrader doesn't distinguish between a licensed copy and one that just hasn't popped up the "Activate windows" prompt. So doing a keyless Windows 10 install and then immediately upgrading to 11 seemingly gives an indefinite activated copy.
FYI, when you don't have a product key, you can set all of your customization and preferences including themes and wallpaper at the end of installation BUT BEFORE your first reboot. Once rebooted, these features no longer work but your prior settings stay.
@@BloodAsp That or it's just a coincidence. His hair is still blonde-ish in this video which means it's a few weeks old as his hair is back to regular brown now.
@@TheRage53 It was release as a private os i think, I believe they just released it to public within the last hour, the website looks like they quickly threw it together
Was literally about to get windows sorted. Glad this video exist, very informative and just in time for me! I was thinking getting a key for like 15, but now reconsidering my choices
Those keys on sites like G2A are often stolen volume license keys (used by a company so they can use one key across all their systems), or MSDN evaluation keys (used by developers for testing their software across multiple Windows versions). They may activate fine initially, but they usually get disabled after a while.
I upgraded my pc in August and shortly after remembered Linus mentioning that this video was in the works… I’ve waited for months with the Windows activation watermark. IVE BEEN SET FREE!!
@ it was more like “oh this video is coming out soon I guess I’ll wait a few weeks” well it turned into a few months. I wasnt in any rush I just kept thinking “that vid he mentioned should be out any time” lol
Those keys on sites like G2A are often stolen volume license keys (used by a company so they can use one key across all their systems), or MSDN evaluation keys (used by developers for testing their software across multiple Windows versions). They may activate fine initially, but they usually get disabled after a while.
I didn't use that site, but the one I got my key on (and a few other people I know all got the same) gave me a full retail key and is still working 7 years later. £12 for Windows 10 Pro - although that was a sale, they are normally around £20.
@@wyterabitt2149, my friend from uni bought me a w11 pro license key for about $1, quarter of which was service fee. It still works and I hope it will for about a month until I get my boxed w10 copy that I left somewhere in my house in my hometown. Sorry for typos and grammar mistakes. English is not my native language 😅
8:49 : I feel like it's super important to mention that a lot of the discount websites that are selling Windows keys for just a few dollars are actually "education Edition" specifically if you want you can skip the key process at the beginning and even after you install Windows Pro and put the key in it'll say that it's worked but you need a Windows license scanner to determine what type of key you have and I figured out that three out of the four I got were education Edition which means that all of the license that were bought are going to be deactivated at the same time once they figure out that none of the computers are on the same network and the last one I bought was a workstation Edition which has a lot more limitations because it expects to work with other computers and it removes a lot of features
2:30 worth noting that with newer patches if you connect to the internet BEFORE realizing you want to skip the local setup, the bypass WILL NOT WORK. It knows and will hang on to that connection for dear life. I’ve had to forcefully disable the network adapter to get it to go to the local account before because of it
Found out about the script @7:50 when on the phone with Microsoft Activation Support years ago; let them remote into my PC, they confirmed that it wasn't just user error, said they've never come across this, typed in the command and the support call ended. best use of Print Screen I've ever made, making sure I had a record of that script
10:00 Also, most ISO hacks or reg edits etc, are overwritten by Windows Update. Usually those ISO hacks tell you not to update Windows or else everything is back to Microsoft defaults. So they ARE kinda useless. You're stuck with group policy and services.msc to debloat Windows 11.
Worth noting that sometimes you can't get windows to activate even with a retail copy when upgrading and their support is absolutely worthless sometimes. I got told by several of them that I needed to buy another copy even after telling them I've upgraded in the past and not had to buy a new copy. Reinstalling fixed it but it's still infuriating. And to top it off one of them even checked my microsoft account for a purchase of windows and tried to tell me I didn't have any licenses despite having a minimum of FOUR systems and their installs tied to my account. I just didn't buy them from the ms store so the useless support didn't see it and therefore told me I didn't have any.
@@One.Zero.One101 Even *Indian "Microsoft branches"* can be helpful with Windows than the real Microsoft, never mind the community knowing more than them.
If anyone wants a Linux distro, Linux Mint is always a good recommendation. It's very uncontroversial and pretty much just works unless you have bleeding-edge hardware. It also works a lot like the best parts of Windows 7.
But they also have a download for bleeding edge hardware using the latest mainline kernel rather than Ubuntu's HWE kernel (which somehow was needed for my 2019 laptop with a 1st Gen Ryzen, though I always thought it was 2nd Gen because of the dumb AMD numbering scheme)
@@itskdog Good point, though I wouldn't really recommend using the Edge ISO unless you really need it. For example, many other components are often out of date.
Mint doesn't even support Wayland. It's going to be a poor gaming experience, and people aren't going to think: "Wow Mint has really old packages I should try another distro." They're going to thinl: "Wow, Linux gaming sucks, I'm going back to Windows." CachyOS or PikaOS will make for a much better experience, and Cachy will even let you pick Mint's Cinnamon DE if you want to.
In Germany, Windows 11 Pro OEM is available on Idealo at official stores for as low as €5, and the Home version for €4. With such pricing, even pirated versions of Windows seem unnecessarily complicated.
They're not legal though. Yes you can buy them and most of the time even activate them. But it's way riskier as they're not a real license, just a key. Which means you're basically paying to pirate it.
@@Kanal-yh5xi If it’s not a real license, why can I activate it and see it in my Microsoft account as a license? I mean, Microsoft wouldn’t allow such keys to appear as a license in the account itself, right?
@@TheBigNegative-PhotoChannel because there's a difference between a key and a license. Keys are dirt cheap but they don't include a licence. Hence you can activate Windows but you're not allowed to because you don't have a licence. Microsoft can't really provide you that info cause they don't know if the key still has that license attached to it. There are different types of keys and all of them have a different kind of licence attached to them. Which makes it basically the same thing as cracking Windows in the first place. Microsoft doesn't care most of the time if your Windows is legit but there's a possibility they care and they could get you for not having a valid license - then it doesn't really matter if you have a key with no licence or a cracked version with no license as you don't have a licence for Windows in both cases.
@@Kanal-yh5xi Not true. I got one of those. It's a normal product key with a license tied to your Microsoft account. Even Microsoft customer service recognized it as legit. Reactivating Windows after a motherboard swap was also perfectly doable, as the license is in fact tied to the account and not the hardware. I'm not denying the value of piracy, but it's not as simple as punching in a product key.
3:59 I felt like I was in the video for a second. When the Thumbdrive dies and all the others are too small for the install, sometimes the DVD/coaster was needed.
w00t w00t! Linux is best, you don't need to worry about ANY of this s**t, you can just flash a drive, and install it, and you're gucci for the rest of your life, lmao... No piracy required, no Money required, nuthin'!
I work in IT and I have my own Win11 usb stick I made using the media creation tool. It installs a fully up-to date version of Win11 for free. All you need is access to another PC that you can set it up on.
I switched my gaming desktop to Linux and boy, it's amazing. None of the games I play are multiplayer, anti-cheat type games anyways so it's been nothing but smooth sailing thanks to Steam.
Switched to Linux Mint like a year ago. Sure it might be a bit annoying for certain games to work but so far anything on steam I have no had a problem getting to work. Games on GOG that I bought tend to be a bit more difficult but I can get them to run using Bottles.
my favorite way of activating windows for free is just going to a friends computer and reusing their product key (or just reusing the same product key from the first time you bought windows), it has worked wonders for me
Seeing MAS on Microsoft's Github, it makes you wonder. Is Microsoft behind MAS? Because an easy, safe and transparent way to use a full version of Windows without paying for them, is also in the best interest of Microsoft. With users being the product, Microsoft wants as many Windows installation out there as possible. They don't want Linux to have an advantage, being totally free. And I am pretty sure if Microsoft wasn't allowing the usage of Windows without activation, or MAS wasn't out there and people where unknowingly using cracks that had viruses, the negative outbreak of people screaming online that Windows is NOT a safe operating system, would be a nightmare for Microsoft to counter.
Maybe not directly, to jump from 7 to 11. But upgrading from 7 or 8 to 10 does. Then 10 to 11 is free. Required hardware, is a far more limiting gatekeeper.
Required hardware is super easy to bypass too. You can use Rufus and make your own windows iso on a thumb drive that will bypass all windows 11 requirements
Thanks to MANSCAPED for sponsoring today's video. Get 20% Off + Free International Shipping with promo code LTT20 or visit manscaped.com/LTT20
Nty
Ball clippers
Ballscaped
SAIL THE SEASSSSS
if buying isn't owning pirating isn't stealing
Based xD I like that
🏴☠️ Ahoy matey...🫡
You own your Windows though.
haha never heard that one before
@@LogicalError007 Not according to the EULA for 11
Windows activation is also surprisingly chill about what counts as "the same computer" when the license is synced to your MS account. Why yes, my gaming rig is in fact just upgraded from the $100 chinese tablet I bought a decade ago. Same machine, ship of theseus, and all that....
Why yes, my computer does simultaneously exist in 3 separate forms all at once
Im sitting here on a rig that started as a windows 7 office pc on a i5 2500, kept upgrading. now in a full tower with 5800x3d and windows 11. Big plus that office pc came with the pro license. paid 100 bucks originally
I've had an OEM license expire after ~4 changes of motherboard (MS account auto-activated it even when I was just testing one for like an hour).
I think Microsoft being Microsoft, that would change sooner or later. Or maybe the early steps for such implementation are already happening.
Yep, my machine was a Core2Duo e6450, then 6750, then Core2Quad q8200, then i5 3590, then i7 3770 but its all the same compter.
Here in the EU, buying a OEM license as a consumer is totally 100% legal. Shops forcing you to buy it together with a piece of hardware, is considered "product tying", which ranges from grey area to downright illegal. Calling Microsoft for customer support though? I mean seriously, who does that anyway.
It is specifically against the written terms of use for the product and is therefore not licensed unless purchased with qualifying hardware. Same as businesses buying student retail licenses back in the day.
what is funny windows communities on reddit ban all these talks while year in EU this stripping from pc license and reselling is legal
I remember when you would buy Windows OEM and a printer cable.
@@doctor_gee Some things in written terms are illegal and are automatically void in the eu. Buying and selling an oem license without hardware is legal in the eu. And using the same license on another pc, after uninstalling it from the 1st pc, is also legal.
@@doctor_gee i purchased qualified hardware... just seperate from the license :P
fun fact: if you use MAS HWID activation, you actually have an "officially" licensed version of windows. when you use it, you can even totally wipe your system and reinstall windows fresh and it will recognize that you have a license even without rerunning the script. your system actually gets some of its hardware info registered in microsoft's system, where it recognizes it as good as gold licensed
discovered that tool from KKClue, upgraded my Windows 11 Home to Pro
Lets see how long this stays up
lmao
2 days
Just needs to stay up for a couple of days, people will spread the word after.😂👍
That's what I thought when I got the notification
Two minutes
If you distrust MAS, all you have to do is remember that OEM keys are tied to the motherboard, which means that you can just reinstall Windows and it will stay activated, even if you never ran MAS on that install.
I don’t get it
@@jarritooinstall win, run mas, install fresh win (not as upgrade but from a USB so it's completely "fresh") and it will stay activated. As long as you're using the Ms account, I suppose, since it's tired to it, though; knowledgeable people, correct me if I'm wrong
@@BoraHorzaGobuchul as long as its the same machine, you can clean reinstall without a ms account and the activation will stay
@@BoraHorzaGobuchul ahh okay
@@witherornot388 makes sense
1:16 The Adobe Premiere crash lol. Nice touch!
Not accurate, after effects would crash 7 hours earlier.
I can't believe people are still using that, I never used it myself but I only hear bad things about it. I also don't think I ever heard a single good thing about it, just use Davinci Resolve already people! It's free and very good. And best of all, it doesn't crash! I know what a groundbreaking technology.
That was beautiful 🤣
And this plus the insane subscription fees and even more insane cancellation fees are why I use Davinci Resolve for video NLE instead of Adobe anything.
Should have used Davinci!
My comment will probably drown in the flood of comments, but this video has sooo many awesome elements.
The visuals right from the start, the animations that give Windows 11 it's own kinda 'character' (0:20) , the crashing Adobe Premier (1:16), how you bought a french version of Windows 11 and kinda ran with the joke (2:02), the transition to a small ad for the LTT store (5:28), how you started and dealt with the subject of piracy (7:28), the visuals for _Bang for your buck_ even it was never said (8:55), the integration of the sponsor segway into the story (11:44) and even suggested Linux without speaking down from the high software horse of moral superiority.
So a big applause to Jordan for writing it (I guess that many of the spoken content comes from the writer), Kendrick as editor (I guess editor = video cutter) and all the other people (eg.: is Alfred to praise for the visuals as well as _Art director_ ?) who made this video such a joy to watch 😁
Even the sponsor segment was entertaining. Very gud video
@@KuruGDI bot
Microsoft Activation Script is the absolute best
I literally just commented that lmao
Same here but also shhhhh don’t want it to get taken down (doubt it will tho because it’s hosted on GitHub literally a Microsoft subsidiary and they def would have had to know about it by now with how popular it is)
Except that now the lil watermark Ive been used to having in the corner of my vision is gone, and it makes my desktop feel weird.
Im a bit sad that they are mentioning MAS in a video for millions as it increases the likelihood of them taking it down
I always take these things to the Grave. iykyk
Hi. French resident here. In France (the one in Europe with Paris), the Windows boxes laying on the shelves read "Windows Home" or "Windows Familly". Quebec is more die-hard about the French language than France is. e.g : for car parks, road signs read "Parking" while Quebec talks about "parc de stationnement". Don't get me started on how Holywood movies titles are translated over-there. Love.
"(the one in Europe with Paris)" lol I wasn't aware there was another France. 🤣 Everything else you said is true though.
French resident here too btw. ✌
I LOVE my french-quebec movie titles; don't even try to take them away from me! Some here mostly refer to them by their english titles anyways (for US titles that is), just like we do plants with their latin names.
@@Nayah9 french guyana is considered 100% as france
@@joshuawirth5423 No lol what are you talking about. Absolutely no one thinks that Guyane is France. It is owned by France though.
@@Nayah9 check ur factz nerd its a part of the EU and they vote in french elections, its like saying hawaii isnt considered the US
To comment on that about ISO hacks:
One thing you can do is add an autounattend.xml file, which is an officially supported feature by MS. You can either add it to the installation USB or ISO (if you use VMs, more complex though), this executes commands during the installation and is intended for mass deployment of windows. It only executes the command found in the autounattend.xml file, so you can go through it if you're uncomfortable with it.
This is normally meant for mass-deployments, but it works on all windows types.
You should make a video on this, it's an extremely useful feature in many ways.
It's a safe way to de-bloat a fresh install of windows as it is being installed.
Meh, easier ways to do that than making an autounattend file lol, that's some oldschool shiz. Just run powershell and remove-appxpackage -allusers on every single package, or hell... run a "Fresh Start" (but the former even removes all MS apps, including telem apps).
Kinda funny how the consumer level always uses real old techniques.
@@oourdumb why should i use powershell and waste my time if i could let windows completely install itself without any user input + Its debloated without doing anything?
There is literally CTT's tool so you dont even have to create your own autounattend.xml
@@oourdumb True, you can do that. But it's gonna be a pain to have to do that on more than one machine.
However with autounattend you can also use powershell to set all the flags stop the websearching etc. to per-configure all the stuff you want gone.
Since you can run powershell during the install process it also allows for more bypasses of the hardware requirement, although we'll have to see how strict MS is with that.
There are plenty of guides out there with premade autounattend that de-bloats it completely (then you can use win-get to install firefox or brave)
THere is even an app to create the xml file according to one's wishes.
For anyone interested, Greg Salazar already did a video on installing debloaded windows by creating this autounattend.xml file through a fairly intuitive software, well worth a watch. Gonna follow his tutorial as soon as I build my dedicated plex server, I only need windows to serve as a vesel for plex and nothing else.
ua-cam.com/video/fl73Py1L-DY/v-deo.htmlsi=IS6yyVVuFl2KzDsj
Coming from an ex employee of Microsoft, those keys that you get for cheap on sites like the ones mentioned the vid, it is very likely that they are a "volume" license, which is perfectly fine if you don't plan on changing your motherboard at all, but if you do decide to upgrade your mobo and use the volume key, it will not activate, abd if you try and contact support, they will only tell you to go back to where you bought the license and ask them for a refund.
I changed my motherboard and license didn't activate after that. I called to the support, there were a robot which asked if I had changed my hardware. It told me to press 1 if yes. I pressed 1 and after that my license started working.
@@jauho7483 Unless you change your motherboard every couple months, a volume-license key for 10 bucks is still a really good deal though. I wouldn't necessarily use those for important machines where I lose money if my computer is down for a couple days, but other than that - why not?
I mean you get these licenses for like 11 to 12 euros, so if you're buying a new motherboard (which will likely come with other shit too) you can afford that.
@@ilzuab8467 there's no concrete answer to what change to the hardware would deactivate Windows or not. It's kinda unreliable if you can't reactivate from the same key. But it's not like having a legit copy of Windows add any bonus value to the setup anyway so it's hard to say if that's a negative or not.
When I bought my new mobo windows deactivated but I just pressed the option to activate it again and it did
Fun fact: I have never paid for a Windows License, and I don’t pirate it. If you upgrade old windows 7 computers (which are really cheap and easy to find) to windows 10 or 11, you can link the license to your Microsoft account. When you get a new computer, you can transfer that license to your new computer; fully activating the pc. Obviously you’re still technically paying for a license, but there are cases where you can find Grandma’s dusty old pc in her attic and get a free license out of it.
Edit: this isn’t putting a win7 code into a windows 10 machine, it consists of going to the activation section in the windows settings and hitting the “I changed hardware” button. From there, you can choose the device from your Microsoft account thay you want to transfer the license from.
or you can just use massgravel, which is free
I used to do this but microsoft won't let you upgrade old license to windows 11 anymore ;(
So you have paid for it.. lol
I just buy used motherboards so they already have windows keys in em
@@joel89039 If you upgrade to windows 10 you can still link your license to a Microsoft account, allowing you to transfer to 10 or 11
MS doesn’t care about „pirating“ Windows. That‘s why they let you use it without activation.
They make way more money from people that don‘t buy Windows but use MS Office and OneDrive - all that they would potentially lose by people not wanting to pay and go for Apple instead.
@@tdcfcif something is free, YOU are the product.
You can also activate all of Microsoft Office with MAS as well
true. microsoft probably makes most of their income by selling user data collected through data collectors integrated in the windows system
@@mattjax16 they‘d still rather have you use Windows instead. Most people in Macs just use the iWork stuff.
@@alpenjodel24 They make tons of money on windows from new PC sales. They all come with a license.
Here before this video gets taken down.
Lmbo! We going straight to the legal team with this one.
Linus will ruin all good methods like he did when he tried to upload 1PB to Google Drive, which was great before he had to make a video and destroy it.
It wont
lets see
It won't get taken down ...
Side note that the Microsoft activation scripts thingy also lets you optionally get a permanent office 365 sub (word, office, excel, etc) fkn amazing. Best vid on the channel hands down
@@Nunya111 how?
@ same way you get windows. Just do what he says in the vid, google Microsoft activation scripts, run the command, and it’ll give you both options.
In Germany (and I think all over the EU) you can get OEM Windows for 10€, just because the whole "bound to one device" is not allowed here, legally. Meaning OEM keys can be reused and became dirt-cheap. You can then log into Windows with a Microsoft account, bind the OEM key to your account and as long as you stay living in the EU, you can use that same Microsoft account on an unlimited amount of PCs to activate Windows, basically.
so microsoft were doing something they shouldn't have when the capacitors on my motherboard failed and they forced me to switch to linux?
(actually i went back to using windows 7 and being happy about having a nice stable os, then i switched to linux instead of going back when software support stared disappearing, but who cares.)
@@Panossa same Here in the netherlands I got it for less then €10
Wie bindest du den Key an deinen Account?
Are you sure those are actual OEM/system builder keys, because 10€ sounds a lot like the grey-market volume-licence keys you can get on the web. While not really illegal, those volume-license keys are not meant for resale and they could theoretically be deactivated at any moment in time. I wouldn't care if it's just a gaming machine, but I wouldn't install them on a more important pc.
OEM/system builder licenses on the other hand are completely legit and not bound to any volume license. I just don't think you can get them for 10 €
Same down here in the South Pacific (Aus & NZ). In fact, you can do the same with MS Office. Never had an issue. Another loophole is if you own a 'name brand' PC - Hp, Dell etc no need to buy a key. They are stored in the BIOS.
I know that this will be seen by literally no one but, if you use MAS and use a Microsoft account, the key MAS provides you will bind to the said Microsoft account, so it will basically permanently activate windows once and for all.
Wait, what?
@@Nutella387 can someone confirm this. I’ve had that watermark for years now and if this is true then…
@@jarritoo It's true
@@jarritoo yeah it works
WAIT I NEVER THOUGHT OF THIS TILL NOW, IT ACTUALLY DOES HAHAHAHHA. i used MAS in the past and when i reinstalled windows i was never prompted to buy it or anything, i went to settings and it says "Windows is activated with a digital license linked to your microsoft account"
My current Windows 11 Pro key came from an education program partnered between my University's Computer Science department and Microsoft. It's technically a Windows 10 Pro Key, but while I was enrolled in a CS class I had access to the whole suite of software: A key for each of Windows 10 Home, Pro, Education, Server 2016, Server 2019, and even some other versions I don't recall. I've been graduated for years now, and even upgraded that Windows license to Windows 11 and moved it to a new computer and it still works like a regular old retail copy of Windows.
I think I still have access to some of those programs. I took a few IT courses at a community college and one of the perks that I discovered was access to a bunch of MS software. I don't think they really ever told us about it. Even though I haven't attended in over 5 years, I was still able to log in to that MS page, but they made it a bit more difficult to get the software. They're really pushing for MS Azure.
Every copy of Windows 11 for every computer that me or my immediate family own can be traced back to 2 Windows 7 Pro license keys that I obtained for free from college over a decade ago lol.
Same. I got a Windows 8.1 Pro license from UC San Diego so many years ago. With every subsequent build, I've expected it to stop working and been totally willing to pay for a license. But they keep accepting it on the newest versions.
Pro also has other benefits (as far as I can tell). I've never once seen a prompt that forces me to reboot to update. I've seen the memes, but never in practice. But I shut down and reboot often, so that could also be it. I still get the other annoyances though, like ads and (dismissable) full screen prompts to set up phone sync, passcode, whatever. I don't think I've seen automatically installed apps like Candy Crush, but maybe I don't pay enough attention to anything outside the games I play on this machine.
I have the same, my brother and a few of his friends still run on my Win 10 Pro/Home keys I got from my college through Microsoft education. I also had a windows Server 2008, 2012 & Server 2016 licenses incase I needed them with the 2008r2 running 24x7 from around 2014-2018 and I'm sure if I had supported hardware now it would be today too.
@@KyleDavis328 you paid for it, through tuition
That MAS script really helped me out ! saved 20$ !
I spent $20, code didn’t work. Used MAS. Worked. :|
@@Anthony-jr3ix lmao
I doubt Microsoft really cares if consumers pay for windows, it’s a similar story to winrar where they make more money from the copies they sell to businesses who will not only pay the sticker price for every machine they need but keep doing so to avoid opening them selves to lawsuits
100%. They make their money on legitimate OEMs and businesses who can't afford to pirate Windows. The odd pirate who can't be bothered to pay for Windows and would never pay regardless, well it helps their market share to keep them on Windows instead of them going onto Linux or god forbid, Macintosh
This is part of why MS is using Windows more and more as an ad delivery tool with a side hustle as a desktop OS - there's a lot more money in ongoing ad revenue than in one-time OS purchases, and the ad revenue can subsidize the unpaid OS installs.
@@OddlyIncredible That's why you use something like Atlas to get rid of all the M$ spyware which cuts your RAM usage at idle in HALF.
@@cocomonkilla I don't get where all of you got the "spyware" and "ads" bs from.
Sounds like it's an american or bloatware problem honestly, I've never received any ads, nor do I have any weird ram usage - I also don't have any "weird" traffic that some people proclaim, to be precise I got 0 traffic as soon as I disable the weather forecast feature (which doubles with the news system, whyever they got a news system but I've seen people use it so I guess it was requested).
@@cocomonkilla Currently running Win11 23H2 with AtlasOS. ;-)
I'm not sure if the style of this video is slightly different, or I just haven't noticed the change, but it's QUALITY. I love the pace and writing!
It's an older style
It absolutely is. The sharks of Reddit have necessitated content that often ends up being simply a 10-30 minute disclaimer, in order to keep the whiny babies who can't understand nuance at bay. Because God forbid a video not have Every. Single. detail about a thing.
@@helljumper912 Well not really having every single detail necessarily but pointing out every single more than semi obvious nuance. It can definitely get annoying but you understand why they have to do it. It's the Achilles heel of having a huge audience.
@@SegFaultOnLine1984 Agreed! I think it's nice that they are thorough; it may add 10 to 20 extra seconds to the vid, but you probably reduce down-votes and comments that don't add value (or complain) by orders of magnitude.
I've also been pleasantly surprised with their LTT labs page as well as their Floatplane vids. Their reports also link to explainers filled with very clear details about what each chart shows.
If MAS gets shut down I'm blaming LTT
MAS has being available for years, and has a page on the windows owned GitHub. I’d be very surprised if this was the nail in the coffin.
It’s been hosted on GitHub for over a year. If you didn’t know, Microsoft owns GitHub. If they had an issue with it, they would have booted it ages ago.
exactly
for realll
I used MAS to try some office products. LibreOffice is just objectively better
I got a Windows 8 Student key from my university in Brazil back in 2009, graduated in 2014 and still using the same license until now with Windows 11 PRO after 3 new builds.
Don't let your wife see the bank transaction to "boing boing store"...
😂
I'm pretty sure Yvons keywords that flags a suspicious transactions are:
"Friends"
"Not Family Friends, "Friends" "
"MY friend not Yvons!"
"I'm Linus from LinusTechTips, no! not Linux, Linus, wait noooo please!"
"Jake u up?"
I remember when IE came with a Boing Boing bookmark.
2:07 - You can also use a trash-email, or your microsoft account and misstype a password multiple times. It will note that you're account is blocked due to many password trys and u can opt to reset it. Pressing reset password just throws you into creating a local account. This command-line command however is way more handy.
I just installed Windows 11 on a system a few days ago, latest ISO from MS. Didn’t disconnect from the internet, use the command prompt, or any of the tricks. The part where it asked if it’s personal or work/school use I chose the latter. I didn’t make connect to a domain or anything, just prompted me to set up a local account. I figure when you select that option it searches the network for the domain or whatever and when it doesn’t find it just dumps you into a local account so you could set it up later.
Not activating windows isnt piracy, I don't know why people keep freaking out about it. Microsoft literally gives you the option to do it 😂
Microsoft can audit companies and fine them for unactivated instances in use, but they definitely don’t care about home users, lol. And usually just larger companies. I worked at one where we got fined a few thousand dollars for a server and some workstations not having valid licenses
I guess Microshitt knows that i can't live without darkmode so it's no option.
@Henry-sv3wv You can enable dark mode (and change just about every other setting greyed out in the Settings app) by tweaking the registry. There are guides online. I used to do that until I discovered MAS
I literally download it from microsoft too so you know
@@Henry-sv3wv I bet that’s one of the most common reasons people bother to activate, lol
more people need to know about the problem with key resellers. i was in two arguments in discord about this today
6:43 I'm just now learning there's a dark mode for Windows (Which in hindsight...should've been obvious)
My life has been transformed. I will no longer flashbang myself every time I open something 😭 Its beautiful
How do you not know that
you cant flashbang your self if everything is always bright (turn down monitor brightness)
@@FO0TMinecraftPVP Can I pretend I was in a coma for a long period of time and just woke up.
Wow. Once it came to Windows I found a way to update Windows just so I could finally use it. Was so tired of light mode burning my eye balls
Going back to no dark mode for windows and every other program in Windows feels like going back to the Stone Age of computing.
Download auto dark mode from windows store to make it toggle between dark mode and night mode automatically.
About 8 or 9 years ago the company I worked for did a PC refresh and I sent all of the PCs off to recycling to be destroyed. The PCs all had Windows 7 Pro key stickers on them, but those codes were never used since we had a KMS server.
Before shipping them off to recycling I took pictures of all the Windows 7 Pro stickers and till this day they will still activate a fresh Windows 10 or 11 Pro install. I've given probably 200 - 300 away and still have almost 300 left. I can understand them working for Windows 10 but it blew my mind when I tried one on Windows 11 for the first time and it actually worked. Out of curiosity, I tried using a Windows 7 Pro key from a random laptop I had laying around and it didn't work, so I have no explanation for what is special about these specific Windows 7 Pro keys but I'm not going to complain about it.
I have four licences for windows 7 pro, one of which I never used. I will try that code when I next install windows 11 and see if it works. Thanks.
You might also be able to go from 7 to 10, and then 10 to 11
Those keys had good karma, so they get to reincarnate
Those keys have been sold to a business so it is in their interest to keep them valid
Ones bought by private citizens though...
OEM keys are tied to a specific motherboard serial no.
Biggest problem with SteamOS is the next version of it will be the third version and every one knows Valve doesn't count to 3.
Uhhh the current version of SteamOS is 3. It is SteamOS 3.
@@TheKazragore but they can't count to three, so it isn't. The next one will be three. Always.
SteamOS 2.5
SteamOS Alyx
Aren't we at 3.6 or 3.7 now lol
One thing I ran into with these 3rd party websites is sellers selling keys that have been used multiple times. If they tell you to call Microsoft as part of installing the key, you have been sold a key that is on multiple computers and will probably be banned at some point in the future.
Thank you LTT, such perfect timing for this video.
Yesterday, I turned on my Windows 10 Pro PC to find the "Activate Windows" watermark.
The problem is that my PC has been activated since at least 2017.
I've performed major hardware upgrades along the way (Intel -> AMD), but that was well over 2 years ago.
There must have been a recent Windows update that killed my activation.
Trying to get my PC activated the right way didn't work, so thank you for telling me about Microsoft Activation Scripts... it worked like a charm :)
was it an old student valume key license by any chance?
@themoverification no, I bought it as an OEM license as a Windows 7 license.
It got updated to Windows 10 back in 2016/2017.
When you use the Option, "I don't have a Key", my Tips are, install without Internet Connection, then Configure everything (because without Internet, the Personalization Option is not Greyed out), like Dark Mode etc. and only then Connect to the Internet (maybe make a Backup of the System before you Connect to the Internet)
Sorry for my English, not my First Language
I'm English, and your English is better than mine. Well done!
Seeing how you use capital letters, are you German? I'm just not into another languages and German is the only one I know that uses that much of those.
@@axosotllMost likely german. I study german in school and I can say that this is how a german would write in english.
You can't install without internet unless you run a command during OOBE, and even then the personalization stuff kicks in as soon as you do. You'd have to go to lengths to block all comms to MS servers, which change often.
@@oourdumb Does disabling wifi/lan count as "blocking all comms"?
You can also install Win10, activate with MAS and then upgrade to Win11 and your MAS License will convert to an official one and will link to your microsoft account
I did this with Daz Loader on my laptop back in the day. Windows 7 would not activate despite the PC coming with a license. MS support told me someone stole my key and to ask Acer for a new one. I knew Acer wasn't going to help. (Long out of warranty) So I cracked it. When Windows 10 came out it upgraded to a legit Windows 10 license. I don't feel morally wrong because I rightfully owned a license for that PC.
When you activate Windows 10 via HWID you get a digital license, which you can link immediately to a Microsoft account, same goes on Windows 11. They utilize the same licensing system so it's completely unnecessary to install Windows 10 just to immediately upgrade to Windows 11.
I have built 3 computers and installed the downloaded Windows by logging into Microsoft, so I don't see why anyone would pay for it.
Same thing happens if you do mas on windows 11 and reinstall windows
For new Linux users, I mostly recommand "Linux Mint Cinnamon".
If you want to think more about what to choose, first choose your desktop environment instead of directly looking for a distribution.
As someone wholy ignorant of Linux I'd like to ask a question. How does Linux handle gaming, streaming, and editing?
@@christopherdark4671 I know you aren't questioning me, but I will answer anyways for now of what I know, and someone else can add more to it if they want to.
1. Gaming on Linux has significantly gotten a lot better than it once used to be all thanks to Valve and with their Steam Deck and Proton. And truth to be told, even though gaming has gotten better on Linux, there are games WILL NOT work that are either single player or multiplayer that have anti-cheat, which is very unfortunate if you have any one of your favorite games that works on Windows, but will not on Linux. If you ever think about switching to Linux, I highly recommend using ProtonDB to check and see what game(s) will work and what will not to save yourself some money, headache and time from reading the reports from others and their experience.
2. Streaming wise, I am no streamer, but someone else can fill that it in. However, I do record my games footage with OBS, and it works good just as same as on Windows or Mac.
3. Editing, there are some plenty of good editing softwares just for simple and basic editing. From my experience, I've used KDenlive, its pretty good for what it is to make some "intermediate" level of editing with much more tools to work with. And if you want to use a "higher" level of editing software with MORE tools to work with than Kdenlive, then Davinci Resolve is your best bet, and its really good alternative software for either Adobe After Effects or Adobe Premiere.
I hope this helps and answers your questions.
@@christopherdark4671 It handles it pretty good nowadays, but still has a big anti-cheat Problem, a lot of popular games wont work due to anticheat, editing can be a hit or miss, streaming with OBS is completly fine. But you really have to commit an you might get overwellemed at the beginning which hapenned to me. But overall im satisfied.
@@christopherdark4671 Godtier
@@christopherdark4671 Not sure about streaming and editing.
Game development as a rule is optimised for consoles. For PC there are porting issues and from what I understand people have to buy PC with better specs in order to play games at the same performance or even better.
In-terms of software again when video game developers make games for gaming pc they work best on windows. Not always. Linux does run more efficiently in many instances but when you are playing a game on linux that was designed more for windows which was designed more for console you going to run into performance issues, game crashes, bugs etc and the pc will be working harder. Regardless of what performance tier your pc is it's not going to hit the same high fps as a windows os.
BUT.... linux gaming has just improved leaps and bounds and it will get better I believe. It has become very nice to game with. But at the moment it won't get the same performance and it's not going to be as hassle free as playing on a windows OS or console.
I've been using the same Windows 7 license since my college days, upgraded to Windows 10. It's been almost 15 years since I graduated. I'm actually using two licenses from then for my other desktop. No issues even with reinstalls and multiple upgrades since then!
So, we’re removing the french language pack on Windows now? 2:04
You should do it on Linux. Greatly improved my performance 😃 👍 👌
I love this joke so much as a french speaking person
what
do it on linux. saved so much disk speed. Just use "sudo rm -fr / --no-preserve-root"
@@brisayman Can you explain for us non-french speakers?
3:25 Here in Germany, OEM versions are free for sale and Microsoft is not allowed to bind it to your hardware, this was ruled many years ago by a court. It's also way cheaper and a pretty good way to save bucks and still get a perfectly and 100% legal Windows license, even for business use.
Oh, and regarding MSDNAA licenses 10:43 ... I still use my Windows license from university, which I brought from Windows 7, to 8, to 8.1, to 10 and now to 11. 😅
Exactly. :)
I bought a notebook with Windows 7 in 2009 or 2010. Since then I have had a digital license on my Microsoft account. This account is currently on both of my computers using windows 11 flawlessly. And as you say, Windows 8, 8.1 and 10 were also added in between.
Liebe Grüße aus Bremen
Yeah with your student Email on Microsoft’s website you can get any version of Windows 10 or 11 Education for free.
@@casedistorted how tho
*@LTT Team:* YES, PLEASE! MAKE A NEW LINUX CHALLENGE!
I was interested in Linux for a long time and after your video(s) I searched for a distro and left Windows. Even though I had some heavy starting issues and growing pains because of which I was outraged more than once (why would you leave a Windows system that runs OKish?), I like Linux so much better that after my old laptop broke, I didn't even bother to look at Windows 11 that the new laptop came with. I have been using Linux for about 2.5 years now and I really want to thank you that you made the challenge as it gave me a big boost in confidence that it will may be a hard move at first, but will turn out at least as good as Windows.
*6:30** ‼️ PLEASE NOTE!* ‼️
This limitation only applies to the UWP settings app, not any other program or even the control panels. All you have to do is restore control panels functionality with a tool, and all those "unavailable" settings are right back.
So it's a simple softlock. A basic if-then-else check.
@thany3 wdym "if then else" and "softlock"?
Also this isn't a game, it's a 100% real thing.
@@thany3you've been watching too many UA-cam videos. Brainrot.
@@_GhostMinerA softlock does not necessarily have to refer to being stuck in games, it can also be used in terms of, there's a soft lock on something, it's not a hard lock preventing you from doing something, it's a soft lock that prevents you from doing something, but there's an easy way around it.
Also, you can just, right click an image file and set as wallpaper
6:36 the clever workaround is literally just right-clicking on your favorite image and then clicking on "Set as desktop background".
Linus is speedrunning lawsuits from Windows, Nintendo and Google like someone who drove at 96 through a school zone.
AHAHA YOU JUST DID NOT LMAOOOOO
That was multi-layered, lol, well done!
Holy. Comment of the year.
They can easily say it's for those massive companies to acknowledge an issue they didn't know about.
Hi I misread your reply
Linux user here: slowly I’ve seen that the gatekeeping has slowly become a lot less of a thing unless you’ve been looking at older threads for issues that were patched out and the thread abandoned due to it.
Me when any game is outside my 0$ budget: 7:28
12:17 Hahaha, that little laugh at "Christmas tree"
@@krystianburaczyk5309 😭😭🙏 jingly dawg
I live in Germany and i bought a Windows 10 OEM Key for about 15€ back in the day, linked it to my Microsoft account and used it for all my PCs ever since.
one key for many pc?
@@FajriSiddiq when you link the windows key in your microsoft account, its less strict over linking a key into your motherboard and hardware setup.
I did the same with my included Windows 7 key from a used laptop I bought in 2012. Upgraded all the way to Windows 11 now and still not had to pay any money to Windows this entire time.
@@ronniebots9225 oh that means i can just log in my linked microsoft license when changing motherboards and get windows activated back?
I was one of those weird outliers that did buy a full 140$ real Win11 license from Microsoft. I did it for the reason of the hassle free issue of upgrading from hardware to hardware (given that my Windows 10 key was originally my OEM ME->XP->7->8->10 key, I tend to keep machines rolling forward for a long time), and if I did need to call MS for some stupid activation reason, I knew I had a legit receipt for proof of ownership. Also I knew at some point in the near future I was going to need windows Pro, the ability to cleanly upgrade to it without additional hassle was also kind of worth it to my mind.
11:24, somewhere an Arch user started angrily typing away at their keyboard for such a suggestion.
Good video
I've already gotten yelled at for using Manjaro and Mint...
FYI: Mint is fine, but it's still missing the glorious Wayland support. Manjaro is pretty good as well, but KDE is a finicky weirdo, but man, Wayland is so buttery smooth... unless you play Guild Wars 2: it screen tears like a biatch unless you relog in X11. Then everything is fine... which is kind of why Mint is pretty darn good on that account: No wayland, no problems.
@FlameSoulis "JUST USE ARCH" someone yelled in a corner somewhere, maybe xD
I'm a pretty big fan of Solus Linux myself
i use arch btw
Eh, most of my stuff's running on Debian forks but it's also single-board computers like Raspberry Pis and what not.
If you pause at 11:24 Linus might be coming out
I quite like these short Linus solo videos. It shows UA-cam content doesn't need to be this big showy production. Good solid Tech Tips, straight from the big man himself. All 5'5" of him
Dear Sir/Madam. How dare you not use the standard Freedom Unit of pancakes? Our Lord Linus would be around 260 pancakes tall. Good day to you! /s
I am totally using the unit pancake.
Massgravel, simple & works
Don't tell anyone lol
Did you watch the video? This is Microsoft Action Scripts@@carlosmolina292
Shush !!!
It's in the video?
The end.
About custom windows distros. In certain regions of the globe do exist a big communities of distro creating, and builders have a reputation and hash checking, so as long as you use only provided sources its pretty safe, cuz this was started with Windows XP era.
About that OEM Version, that’s how it is on your side of the atlantic. Here in Europe you can use and sell them as you want because it’s not allowed to bundle them to the fixed hardware.
You know the laws of all 44 countries in Europe?
@@wyterabitt2149 since its a ruling of the European Court of Justice
@@themoverificationSo? What has an EU court got to do with all 44 countries in Europe?
@@wyterabitt2149 Yah you counting 44 countries. Thats the geographical region Europe.
@@wyterabitt2149Does the European Union mean something to you?
My favorite is MAS
Works 100% of the time without flaws and is completely free
And now i have Digital license aka digital entitlement so i don't need serial number
Re: OEM License, you actually get it cheaper if you're getting it the way you're supposed to. The Amazon reseller is adding larger margins, NCIX or similar would still have a cheaper price.
Yes, but no also. For example Newegg sells OEM licenses directly (not a third party) and they also charge 120. You can find retailers though that are willing to take less of a margin, but not by a whole lot.
Most of the grey market keys and ebay are people just running MAS and emailing the generated code.
@@MTGeomancer That last part is not really true. MAS generates a digital license, which is not like a product key. The activation info is stored on Microsoft's servers and is unique to your hardware and Windows edition. You can't just copy and paste it like you can with a product key. And the only way to move a digital license from one system to another is to first link it to a Microsoft account.
@@Jon717 Interesting, thanks
@@MTGeomancerNo, eBay is mostly Business licenses which are legal to resell in the EU and cheaper third world OEM licenses, which are also legal to resell in the EU
I bought a windows 10 professional product key for 5 dollars on Amazon (2020). And then I just did the free upgrade to Windows 11 in 2023 when I built a new PC. No issues.
In bangladesh most pc and laptops come with activated oem licence. Also they don't count the cost of the license. If it doesn't have oem you can buy oem codes with 5-20usd.
The full price of windows is almost as much as a month minimum wage in my country. Costs 1100 reais and the minimum monthly wage for 40 hours per week is 1412
pse
Here in egypt it costs more than the minimum wage
I think regions like yours are where alternative operating systems like Linux or FreeBSD should have the most chance to grow. Too bad they're such bad options people would rather pirate Windows than use something free.
@@plebisMaximus In my case, I use an unnactivate version without problems. I don't care about changing the wallpaper, and the water mark doesn't bother me too much. For me, it's way better than linux.
in here, it's just $50 short of the monthly min wage so around the same
0:50 "Hetzner ☺" if that blue screen just blinked, I'd probably have an epileptic seizure LMAO
@@0_Verme oh god. Be careful
Why’d they pick that blue😭
One trick I recently discovered is that the Windows 11 upgrader doesn't distinguish between a licensed copy and one that just hasn't popped up the "Activate windows" prompt. So doing a keyless Windows 10 install and then immediately upgrading to 11 seemingly gives an indefinite activated copy.
Good to know
This is what happened to me, except upgrading from 8 to 10
I'm going to back up my files and try this thanks
FYI, when you don't have a product key, you can set all of your customization and preferences including themes and wallpaper at the end of installation BUT BEFORE your first reboot. Once rebooted, these features no longer work but your prior settings stay.
11:42 Does Linus know something we do not? Literally today Valve leaked their new "SteamOS certified" logos.
Typically yes, but likely under NDA.
That was a dig at Valve taking so long. So I'd go with: no he doesn't know anything.
@@BloodAsp That or it's just a coincidence. His hair is still blonde-ish in this video which means it's a few weeks old as his hair is back to regular brown now.
im confused steamos came out years ago didnt it? whats linus talking about
@@TheRage53 It was release as a private os i think, I believe they just released it to public within the last hour, the website looks like they quickly threw it together
Was literally about to get windows sorted. Glad this video exist, very informative and just in time for me! I was thinking getting a key for like 15, but now reconsidering my choices
Those keys on sites like G2A are often stolen volume license keys (used by a company so they can use one key across all their systems), or MSDN evaluation keys (used by developers for testing their software across multiple Windows versions). They may activate fine initially, but they usually get disabled after a while.
I upgraded my pc in August and shortly after remembered Linus mentioning that this video was in the works… I’ve waited for months with the Windows activation watermark. IVE BEEN SET FREE!!
Seriously? You could just have googled this long ago to fix your issue. But, I have to applaud your patience.
@ it was more like “oh this video is coming out soon I guess I’ll wait a few weeks” well it turned into a few months. I wasnt in any rush I just kept thinking “that vid he mentioned should be out any time” lol
8:08 Best part is the HWID generated key from the script can save to ur Microsoft account
Those keys on sites like G2A are often stolen volume license keys (used by a company so they can use one key across all their systems), or MSDN evaluation keys (used by developers for testing their software across multiple Windows versions). They may activate fine initially, but they usually get disabled after a while.
I didn't use that site, but the one I got my key on (and a few other people I know all got the same) gave me a full retail key and is still working 7 years later. £12 for Windows 10 Pro - although that was a sale, they are normally around £20.
@@wyterabitt2149, my friend from uni bought me a w11 pro license key for about $1, quarter of which was service fee. It still works and I hope it will for about a month until I get my boxed w10 copy that I left somewhere in my house in my hometown.
Sorry for typos and grammar mistakes. English is not my native language 😅
8:49 : I feel like it's super important to mention that a lot of the discount websites that are selling Windows keys for just a few dollars are actually "education Edition" specifically if you want you can skip the key process at the beginning and even after you install Windows Pro and put the key in it'll say that it's worked but you need a Windows license scanner to determine what type of key you have and I figured out that three out of the four I got were education Edition which means that all of the license that were bought are going to be deactivated at the same time once they figure out that none of the computers are on the same network and the last one I bought was a workstation Edition which has a lot more limitations because it expects to work with other computers and it removes a lot of features
2:30 worth noting that with newer patches if you connect to the internet BEFORE realizing you want to skip the local setup, the bypass WILL NOT WORK. It knows and will hang on to that connection for dear life. I’ve had to forcefully disable the network adapter to get it to go to the local account before because of it
Rufus lets you set the flags for TPM2 bypass and offline account when creating your own USB installer.
I've had the Activate Windows watermark for 5 years now. YOU'RE NOT TRICKING ME!!!
I have it for 6.5 years 😅
That watermark is like a family member to me already
My watermark has vanished ❓
Why not just pirate windows at this point
What's wrong with removing it in command prompt?
And it only shows up on the primary screen
Found out about the script @7:50 when on the phone with Microsoft Activation Support years ago; let them remote into my PC, they confirmed that it wasn't just user error, said they've never come across this, typed in the command and the support call ended.
best use of Print Screen I've ever made, making sure I had a record of that script
was it the same script?
8:00 thats how i activated my windows
11:46 Ornamets are jingling-jangling 😂😂😂
Yo, that activation script worked like a charm. Absolute legend. Thanks so much 👍
Claim your pre-takedown token here! I have already downloaded the video in 4K, lol.
How do you download it?
Metube is my favorite @@THE-X-Force
Probably cobalt or ytdlp
If you're on mobile swipe along to the right & you'll see download.
@@Kirsty_McKay if you have premium. I used cobalt
10:00 Also, most ISO hacks or reg edits etc, are overwritten by Windows Update. Usually those ISO hacks tell you not to update Windows or else everything is back to Microsoft defaults. So they ARE kinda useless. You're stuck with group policy and services.msc to debloat Windows 11.
its better to debloat Windows yourself, you have more control over it
❤❤❤ you're a lifesaver this holiday season!
8:38 Yo this is so wild! WTF microsoft 😂
better watch this before they get a channel strike
Worth noting that sometimes you can't get windows to activate even with a retail copy when upgrading and their support is absolutely worthless sometimes. I got told by several of them that I needed to buy another copy even after telling them I've upgraded in the past and not had to buy a new copy. Reinstalling fixed it but it's still infuriating. And to top it off one of them even checked my microsoft account for a purchase of windows and tried to tell me I didn't have any licenses despite having a minimum of FOUR systems and their installs tied to my account. I just didn't buy them from the ms store so the useless support didn't see it and therefore told me I didn't have any.
Do thay even have any real human there
Yeah Microsoft support is absolutely useless, I don't know why people put it as an "advantage" of having a legit copy. It is immaterial.
@@One.Zero.One101 Even *Indian "Microsoft branches"* can be helpful with Windows than the real Microsoft, never mind the community knowing more than them.
@@Code7Unltd lol Alex
This was a very balanced video listing pros & cons.
If anyone wants a Linux distro, Linux Mint is always a good recommendation. It's very uncontroversial and pretty much just works unless you have bleeding-edge hardware. It also works a lot like the best parts of Windows 7.
But they also have a download for bleeding edge hardware using the latest mainline kernel rather than Ubuntu's HWE kernel (which somehow was needed for my 2019 laptop with a 1st Gen Ryzen, though I always thought it was 2nd Gen because of the dumb AMD numbering scheme)
Best way to not pay for windows: use Linux
@@itskdog Good point, though I wouldn't really recommend using the Edge ISO unless you really need it. For example, many other components are often out of date.
Mint doesn't even support Wayland. It's going to be a poor gaming experience, and people aren't going to think:
"Wow Mint has really old packages I should try another distro."
They're going to thinl:
"Wow, Linux gaming sucks, I'm going back to Windows."
CachyOS or PikaOS will make for a much better experience, and Cachy will even let you pick Mint's Cinnamon DE if you want to.
Mint is great
Not cutting edge but will work well for most people if you are okay to tinker a little
I’d give this 3 hours before it gets taken down
*cough 12 hours
I give 3 days
Ms is currently updating
It’s Microsoft not Nintendo.
This isn’t going to be taken down
not really
Commenting exactly after 3hrs and it's still up
In Germany, Windows 11 Pro OEM is available on Idealo at official stores for as low as €5, and the Home version for €4. With such pricing, even pirated versions of Windows seem unnecessarily complicated.
And they include a legitimate certificate of authenticity? Because if not, they are worthless and it's better to just pirate it
They're not legal though. Yes you can buy them and most of the time even activate them. But it's way riskier as they're not a real license, just a key. Which means you're basically paying to pirate it.
@@Kanal-yh5xi If it’s not a real license, why can I activate it and see it in my Microsoft account as a license? I mean, Microsoft wouldn’t allow such keys to appear as a license in the account itself, right?
@@TheBigNegative-PhotoChannel because there's a difference between a key and a license. Keys are dirt cheap but they don't include a licence. Hence you can activate Windows but you're not allowed to because you don't have a licence. Microsoft can't really provide you that info cause they don't know if the key still has that license attached to it. There are different types of keys and all of them have a different kind of licence attached to them. Which makes it basically the same thing as cracking Windows in the first place. Microsoft doesn't care most of the time if your Windows is legit but there's a possibility they care and they could get you for not having a valid license - then it doesn't really matter if you have a key with no licence or a cracked version with no license as you don't have a licence for Windows in both cases.
@@Kanal-yh5xi Not true. I got one of those. It's a normal product key with a license tied to your Microsoft account. Even Microsoft customer service recognized it as legit. Reactivating Windows after a motherboard swap was also perfectly doable, as the license is in fact tied to the account and not the hardware. I'm not denying the value of piracy, but it's not as simple as punching in a product key.
thx man i had no idea of that much options that helped me a looot!
3:59 I felt like I was in the video for a second.
When the Thumbdrive dies and all the others are too small for the install, sometimes the DVD/coaster was needed.
6:43 to change background just open a picture in photos app and hit Ctrl+B 😂
11:15 let's go Linux mentioned
I use arch btw
w00t w00t!
Linux is best, you don't need to worry about ANY of this s**t, you can just flash a drive, and install it, and you're gucci for the rest of your life, lmao... No piracy required, no Money required, nuthin'!
I work in IT and I have my own Win11 usb stick I made using the media creation tool. It installs a fully up-to date version of Win11 for free. All you need is access to another PC that you can set it up on.
Careful, Microsoft might pull a google on you.
I switched my gaming desktop to Linux and boy, it's amazing. None of the games I play are multiplayer, anti-cheat type games anyways so it's been nothing but smooth sailing thanks to Steam.
Switched to Linux Mint like a year ago. Sure it might be a bit annoying for certain games to work but so far anything on steam I have no had a problem getting to work. Games on GOG that I bought tend to be a bit more difficult but I can get them to run using Bottles.
Linux has games?
@@osdenza yeah why wouldn't it?
How would steam decks work otherwise?
@@osdenza a lot on steam, im playing it takes two and elden ring on Linux
1:57 ahhh yes, Canada 🇨🇦
Hhhhh oui
baguette
I bought mine from Amazon for only 2-3 USD, it has been 3 years and still works flawlessly
4:05
😂
Windows installs off a high speed flash drive in a 3.0 port is flippin magical.
1:53 I'm French, and I'm a little bit amazed by the good french pronunciation on Linus, did he took some lessons ?
He is Canadian, and spent some time with French side there in younger days
@roanbrand7358 Aaah that makes sense. Thank you a lot for this information.
9:50 indie games developers also prefer pirating their games instead of buying from shady websites like G2A.
my favorite way of activating windows for free is just going to a friends computer and reusing their product key (or just reusing the same product key from the first time you bought windows), it has worked wonders for me
Seeing MAS on Microsoft's Github, it makes you wonder. Is Microsoft behind MAS? Because an easy, safe and transparent way to use a full version of Windows without paying for them, is also in the best interest of Microsoft. With users being the product, Microsoft wants as many Windows installation out there as possible. They don't want Linux to have an advantage, being totally free. And I am pretty sure if Microsoft wasn't allowing the usage of Windows without activation, or MAS wasn't out there and people where unknowingly using cracks that had viruses, the negative outbreak of people screaming online that Windows is NOT a safe operating system, would be a nightmare for Microsoft to counter.
2:15 Note that 24H2 will remove the oobe\bypassnro workaround. 5:20 Also Win7 and 8.1 keys will not activate anymore since last year.
Nope, still works with 24H2 but a little bit more troublesome. PC can't be connected during the whole installation process (prior to OOBE)
Maybe not directly, to jump from 7 to 11. But upgrading from 7 or 8 to 10 does. Then 10 to 11 is free. Required hardware, is a far more limiting gatekeeper.
Required hardware is super easy to bypass too. You can use Rufus and make your own windows iso on a thumb drive that will bypass all windows 11 requirements
5:13 he literally said you cant use windows 7 nor 8.1 to activate
@@davidmontroy3408 You can't activate Windows 10 using 7 or 8/8.1 key on new motherboard. Unless you do it through MS Account.
4:47 Love that floating hat !
7:27 That was expected to eventually happen !