Hello everybody!
This video is about how to upgrade your computer or laptop for free from Windows 7 or 8 to
Windows 10, while preserving your key and activation.
All users of Windows 7 and 8 had the opportunity to upgrade to Windows 10 for free by 29 July
2016.
Some of them took this chance, and some didn’t.
At the moment, it is no longer possible to upgrade Windows 7 or 8 to Windows 10 for free.
So if you need to upgrade your operating system, you can do it only when you buy an official
copy of Windows 10.
Nevertheless, there is still one official method to upgrade your Windows 7 or 8 to Windows
10 and not to lose registration data of your current operating system.
My computer has an activated version of Windows 7 Ultimate.
It is an important aspect because only activated systems can be upgraded.
Use only official copies of Windows by Microsoft.
To upgrade your system to Windows 10: • Follow the link in the description of
this video to go to the special page at Microsoft official website.
The page title, namely “Customers who use assistive technologies can upgrade to Windows
10 at no cost,” should not worry you.
Due to the company’s policy, it provides an indefinite period of time for people who
use assistive technologies to upgrade to Windows 10.
As practice shows, Microsoft does not ask for any confirmation.
• That is why, click on “Upgrade Now.”
• As a result, an update to Windows 10 will be downloaded to your computer.
It will help us complete the upgrade.
• Double-click to start it.
• Accept the Licence Agreement.
• After that, the Upgrade Wizard will check your computer for compatibility with Windows
10.
We would like to point out, that to be compatible with Windows 10 your computer should have
at least a 1 GHz processor, 1 GB of random access memory for a 32-bit operating system
and 2 GB for a 64-bit one, and about 20 GB of free space in your system drive.
However, these are minimal system requirements for Windows 10.
If your computer looks very much like that, I wouldn’t recommend installing Windows
10 - you are likely to have freezes and lags, and complain that it doesn’t work properly.
That is why installing Windows 10 on an old computer is clealry not a good idea.
• My computer is compatible.
Then click Next.
• The wizard begins downloading a Windows 10 image, corresponding to what version of
Windows you have now, from the Internet.
One more warning: don’t forget that the image being downloaded can have the size of
3 GB or larger depending on its version.
That is why if you have a slow or limited fee-paid 3G Internet connection, such download
can eat up all your money or be very long.
• After the download is complete, the system will check the image for integrity.
• As a result, the upgrading process begins.
For the first 30 or 40 minutes, everything works with the current operating system, so
you can do whatever you need to.
• Then, the system will tell you it has to be restarted.
You will have 30 minutes to do it.
At this time, disconnect all peripherals from the computer to prevent any possible conflicts
or failures, and leave only the mouse and the keyboard.
For the same reason, disconnect and close all third-party software and your antivirus.
• After restart, standard Windows 10 installation process continues.
• Depending on how powerful your computer is and the speed of your hard disk, it can
take from 30 minutes to several hours, and you will see a completion message in the end.
• Wait for updates to be processed.
When working on them, the computer will restart several times.
There is nothing unusual about it.
Also, I would like to note that at this stage you may encounter a BSOD (“blue screen of
death”) error or recurrent system restarts during the installation.
There may be many reasons for that, but if it happens, you will need to make a clean
installation of the operating system in order to get Windows 10 on your computer.
You can learn more about it in other videos by our channel.
• After the updates have been processed, you can see Windows welcome window and the
name of your account; select the language and click Next.
• In the following window, you can change Windows parameters by clicking on Settings,
or choose to “Use standard/default settings” as I do.
They will be enough for normal everyday work with your computer.
• The window “New apps for new Windows” is there for information only.
Microsoft uses it to let us know about the new standard applications: Photos, Groove
Music, Movies & TV, Edge browser...
Next.
• At this stage, Windows Update is almost over, and it will tell you about it.
The computer is getting ready.
Don’t turn it off.
• The message that your update was successful.
• Exit.
• Right-click on the Start menu/System to see that your copy of Windows 10 is activated!
• When updating your operating system in this way, all installed programs, files, shortcuts
and user settings will be preserved.
• Now your system disk will have less free space.
It happens because now there is Windows.old folder in your disk C.
It can be deleted in the following way:  Go to Properties of disk C,
 Disk Cleanup,  Clean up system files,
 check the box next to “Previous Windows Installations”
 and click OK.
 As a result, the folder Windows.old will be deleted.
 This function can also be used to clean the system disk from all other unnecessary
files.
But before doing it, remember that the folder Windows.old is the only way to reset your
operating system 10 days after updating it.
You can do it if after updating to Windows 10 you realized that you don’t like it,
or it is not good for your needs.
If you delete the folder Windows.old, you won’t be able to roll back your system,
and returning to Windows 7 will only be possible with clean (or full) installation.
You can learn more about it in another video by our channel.
Also, one of the following videos will show you how to roll your operating system back
to the previous version of Windows after you updated it to Windows 10.
If you lost some files as a result of installing, reinstalling, updating or resetting Windows,
you can bring them back with Hetman Partition Recovery.
If you liked this video, click the Like button below and subscribe to our channel to see
more.
We’ll be glad to answer any questions in comments.
Thank you for watching and good luck!