Retail Version of Windows 10

Happy New Year!

Quick question. My father recently passed away and he has a HP laptop. It is currently running MS Win 8.1. I am planning on giving his laptop to my 12yr old daughter for school work, email and internet. I was wondering if I could install Windows 10 using the retail version I bought for my personal desktop. Is this possible since the free upgrade is no longer available?

If you really want W10 (I'd stick with the 8.1 you already have on it to avoid the majority of the telemetry going on);
http://www.pcgamer.com/you-can-still-upgrade-to-windows-10-for-free-thanks-to-loophole//

What is your Dad's laptop model number? HP has a way with dictating your OS. They may have decided you can run Win 8 only, or they may have granted access to Win 10 drivers.

Sorry for your loss.
Even if you get around drivers, the licensing issues are of concern with free upgrade to Windows 10 having expired.
There may be a way for you to upgrade for free still but the option of factory resetting Windows 8 (good till 2023) and installing Classic Sell http://www.classicshell.net/downloads/ would put your laptop in a perfectly usable state in minutes with all drivers already factory installed and everything reset to brand new and not having to deal with all Windows 10 headaches, most people I know would recommend that option and would recommend against Win10 since you gain nothing before 2023, but lose so much by installing Win10 before then.

Thanks everyone. The HP model is HP 2000 (2D10NR) Notebook PC. I tried seeing if I could even download Win 10 but it keeps getting stuck on the 99% Install status.

Factory Reset (or not) then upgrade https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10 and if that doesn't work, you will need to create an installation iso.
You will need a new Windows 10 license unless you know the workaround for owners of Windows 7/8 valid licenses.

For fresh installations on laptops (if update does not work), if BIOS Legacy Support is set to Disabled then ENABLE IT TO BOOT FROM USB FLASH DRIVE.
You may also need to disable secure boot, depending on what you are doing.

The key is tagged to the board you can use the windows 10 retail install media you have to do a simple windows 10 clean install. It will automatically pull the key and select home/pro for the install.

And yes before someone asks this still works after the "free upgrade" period expired from microsoft. The 7/8/8.1 keys all activate 10 without issues.

cdawall said:

The 7/8/8.1 keys all activate 10 without issues.

Click to expand...

Ha. Last year we speculated that this would happen. They're giving it away just to get people on 10, thanks for confirming that.

I suspected this when I was able to upgrade a couple of customer machines from 7 to 10 shortly after the free upgrade window expired. I haven't tried it lately, however so I wasn't sure if it would still work.

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c627627 said:

Factory Reset (or not) then upgrade https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10 and if that doesn't work, you will need to create an installation iso.
You will need a new Windows 10 license unless you know the workaround for owners of Windows 7/8 valid licenses.

For fresh installations on laptops (if update does not work), if BIOS Legacy Support is set to Disabled then ENABLE IT TO BOOT FROM USB FLASH DRIVE.
You may also need to disable secure boot, depending on what you are doing.

Click to expand...

This.