Solved Win 10 activation problem dock/no dock

[mickjf]

So while trying to resolve a problem with the dock USB3 ports operating at USB2 speeds I unintentionally solved a problem I'd had with Win 10 not activating from a clean install after a successful in place upgrade.

Can't believe I didn't twig to this earlier but when I did the in place upgrade to Win 10 I did it while connected to the dock. Then when I did a clean install later with my SP3 undocked Win 10 refused to activate.

It is seeing different hardware from the initial in place upgrade so refused to activate. I can see this might end up being a real pain for people who either sell their dock or their SP3 to someone without the dock the upgrade was done with.

 

[ximoosea]

Wow, maybe that explains my problem. I did the proper upgrade from Win8.1 to Windows 10. It activated fine and I ran that way for a few weeks. I never liked how the upgrade left remnants of files/directories and how it created a mess with the partitions. Thus, I decided to do a clean install of Windows 10. The clean install did not activate and after 2!!! hours on hold and on the phone with Microsoft, the answer I got was that my key was fine and it should activate within 3 days. Three days later, no activation. Instead of calling and waiting on hold again I decided to try another fresh install. This time I was at home without my dock. Sure enough it activated this time. Not sure it was what you described or not, but it seems very plausible. Wish I would have seen your advice a week ago!