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Windows 7 Student Select Activation

This addresses activation issues when installing Windows 7 Pro or Ultimate from the media purchased by individuals from WISC or the DoIT Tech Store. This does not apply to Windows 7 Enterprise media sold to departments for installation on UW-owned computers.

Before attempting any operating system upgrade, you should back up all your files.

The Windows 7 student select items sold through WISC or the DoIT Tech Store are upgrade items: you can only install them on a computer that was previously licensed for Windows or one of the other qualifying operating systems.

The media can be used to do a clean install (which Microsoft sometimes calls a "custom install"), by booting from the installation media. Microsoft had to make that possible since upgrading your existing operating system only works on Vista installations.

However, in some cases, Windows will not accept valid product keys after performing a clean installation of Windows 7, and so will be unable to activate. That does not happen consistently for all clean installations, but is likely to happen when installing on a new hard drive or one on which all data has been overwritten. You'll know you have this problem if you see this after entering your product key:

The following techniques work around this issue to activate Windows 7. In these techniques, you should not enter your product key during Setup. Instead, enter your product key after installation is complete.

Please note that these solutions are not supported by DoIT, WISC, Microsoft, or Apple.

Macintosh users experiencing this issue while installing on a Fusion, Boot Camp, or Parallels partition, please see Technique 3.

Technique 1: Insert the Windows 7 media in your PC, reboot the computer, boot off the DVD, and then follow the steps to install Windows 7. If you are installing onto a computer that already has another version of Windows, be sure to back everything up first. Do not provide your product key during Setup.

After Windows 7 is set up, run Windows Update, download any pending updates, reboot as needed, and repeat until there are no more updates. Then, type activate in Start Menu Search to bring up the Activate Windows utility. Type in your product key and attempt to activate Windows.

If it works, you're done. If not, go to the next technique.

Technique 2: If the above fails, try the double install technique. In the double-install technique, you will perform a clean install without attempting to activate, then upgrade that installation.

After you have completed the initial install:

1. With Windows running, put the Windows 7 DVD in the DVD drive and choose Run Setup from the auto-run dialog that appears. Or, if it is already inserted, navigate to the optical drive in Computer and double-click its icon to trigger Setup.

2. When asked to choose in Setup, choose Upgrade (not Custom). Windows 7 will install again, but will take longer this time. After the upgrade is complete, type the user name (and password) you created during the first install and log on to Windows 7.

To activate Windows 7, type "activate" in Start Menu Search. This brings up the Activate Windows utility. Type in your product key and attempt to activate Windows.

Technique 3: (for Macintosh)

1. Install Windows 7 normally using your emulation software of choice.

2. When you get to this activation screen:

a. Do not enter your product key,

b. Uncheck the Automatically activate Windows when I'm online checkbox, and

c. Click the next button.

3. Reinstall Windows 7 as an upgrade.

4. After you've finished the upgrade install, log in to Windows. To activate, type "activate" in Start Menu Search. This brings up the Activate Windows utility. Type in your product key and attempt to activate Windows.