garrigus



Some also say you can call support and use phone activation, but not sure about that.

yep , I have and they did.. they give you certain things to type in. took 5 minutes..

it's a pointless exercise really , they could have just got you to type in the OLD xp, as well  or whatever number and save time.

John


Now that is nice to hear.  

I'll Say :-)

John

Unlike Vista that required 2 installs for a clean install of the upgrade disk Win 8 is just a simple matter of install it and be done.
 

If you're referring to the very same method that works for Win7, there's actually an easier way involving a simple regedit tweak and a command line thingy... one install, not two... Clean installs def the way to go... mind your license p's and q's, kiddies... :)

 I actually updated over Windows 7 x64. I had some issues with it. I found a function in Windows 8 called "refresh" 
 It did a fresh install on my C: drive and put all of my docs in a "Windows Old" file. 
 I had to re-install all of my software, but I ended up with a nice clean installation. 

Once again today the MS Techs assured me that a clean install is possible and there are NO upgrade DVDs available.
So this is 2 different techs-weird.
 
Anyway,as I said above all is well, just wanted to mention a feature I found also that's great.
Built in Recimg.exe command line.What you do is make an image and that image, when placed where the info tells you becomes your "refresh my PC" backup like Joeb mentions above.
 
Now that is cool. IMHO(I can post the steps or you can google the exe)

Just reading the interwebs a bit... sounds like the registry/command line method works for Win8 clean installs as well... and by "clean" I mean virgin hard drives...

stratman70


Well, finally after hours with Microsoft on the phone with techs who, well english was not their 1st language-not their fault but made it tough on me.
I was asking how I could install win 8 pro upg on a blank SSD? Boy th run around.
 
But, well I bet you guys already know this or at least some of you do-
There is NO Win 8 Upgrade DVD-they never made one-they just call it that .
 
But it took 6 people before I was told that-the first 5 said you cannot do it???????

Check out this : https://sites.google.com/...gy/computers/windows-8

Create the Windows 8 ISO image DVD and install to your SSD


Rail