100% legal way for 1 activation for many Windows systems

Hi folks
This is 100% legal -- other than the standard way of buying a load of extra licenses or using still valid old technet and Win 7 keys.

This method will create a load of installs - but you can't use them concurrently.

Simply on your physical machine create a space containing as many vhdx files as you want Windows installs and install them by the well tried /dism /Apply-Image and bcdboot. One Activation but up to depending on space X n installs . Cleaner, quicker and more reliable than the classical setup.exe method where also sometimes you will need to enter the computers BIOS menu to boot from a different physical disk.

Note vhdx files can be on different physical disks but the Windows blue boot menu will give you boot selection without needing to go into the BIOS.

If you install to an external ssd or example to create windows2go system(s) the only drawback is that you can't update via WU to a newer release of a build although normal updates e.g WD definitions are OK.

So what you can do in this case is :

Simply create a VM (on whatever platform you like) with a BIG virtual disk size. Now on that Virtual disk create as many vhdx files s you want Windows installations for and install via the trusted dism /Apply-image and bcdboot for each one. When the VM boots you'll get a menu for which system you want to boot.

Update the Windows system you want - and copy the vhdx file back to the physical system. On the physical system simply boot any Windows install media -->repair system -->command mode. Attach the vhdx and run the bcdboot to re-install the bootloader.

Beware though -- cloning a physical Win2Go back to an internal disk will still make windows think it's running from a USB -- which can cause all sorts of problems. You don't need to clean install again or need paid software like AOEMI or hasleo's wintousb things.
simply copy vhdx file to the internal disk , boot a windows install media and re-install the bootloader again.

I tried this out because I don't know for how long those old technet keys will work or old keys from W7/W8/W8.1 will keep working !!!! and I'm very suspicious of those really cheap Windows licenses. I'm not really minded to pay around 160 EUR for testing out a few systems that I don't use very often.

This way works for me better because it's much easier if I want different languages rather than have them all in the same windows system and I can create systems with different users and different rights too especially as VM's.


Cheers
jimbo

Jimbo, I know that this is a somewhat older thread, but I just stumbled upon this now.

I hope that I am following what you are saying correctly. If you read my response and it becomes clear that I'm off on some other tangent, my apologies, but I think I'm accomplishing what you are via a different method.

I often create Hyper-V VMs for testing purposes, but they tend to be short lived VMs, ranging from a few hours to a few days. So, years ago, I created about 10 VMs and made a backup of them before installing and activating Windows, By doing this, I end up with VMs that are only about 4MB in size. You could also backup the VM after Windows has been installed, but just disconnect the virtual HD first so that you end up with a nice small backup.

Now, whenever I create a new VM, I restore one of my backed up VMs and install Windows. After installation, it activates just fine.

With VMware workstation, it's even easier. VMware has a configuration file with a .VMX extension. Open that file and save the line that starts with "uuid.bios". Now, if you ever destroy your VM and create a new one, simply replace that one line in your VMX file and that copy of Windows will activate. This is NOT for running multiple illegitimate copies of Windows activated in several VMs, it's simply a way to be able to restore a single VM easily, doing a new, clean install, without having to backup the whole VM. It's much like reactivating on a physical machine after you reinstall Windows.