Win 8.1 Build 9600 randomly became deactivated. Why?

C

Converge

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Mar 4, 2005
Messages
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So I've already fixed this issue with a refresh and hour long call to Microsoft, but I'm wondering if anyone else ever dealt with this.

It's a brand name PC that came with 8.1 pre-installed, it's been updated along the way of course but never removed and the key was never used on another machine by me.

Windows was fine in the morning, came back to my PC after a few hours and this "Activate Windows" screen was up. Windows was gimped and in "not activated" mode.

I got my windows key and when inserting it into the prompt windows says it isn't valid. Also try to go through the SLUI 4 prompt to call but it hangs and doesn't work.

After talking to MS and doing a refresh and having my key verified or changed, they were able to re activate me.

So all good now but driving me crazy trying to figure it out.

So far I'm thinking either

A - Windows became corrupted, which is why SLUI 4 wouldn't work and possibly why my task manager started becoming Un responsive. It would still work, didn't seem like any virus, but it just wouldn't close properly.

B - Someone got my windows key and activated another machine. I doubt it's this as my PC is always up to date with security updates for defender and firewall is running, along with month scans for malware/viruses.

I saw people with the same issue online but never saw any reasoning behind the issue or why it happens.

???
 
Converge said:
I got my windows key and when inserting it into the prompt windows says it isn't valid. Also try to go through the SLUI 4 prompt to call but it hangs and doesn't work.
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Where did you obtain your Windows key from if it's an OEM built computer?
 
I used a free program to locate it. I forget what its called, i downloaded it for this reason alone and after i got the key written down i did a system restore from last week. Trust me it's a legit copy. It's my MSI laptop that came with Windows from the factory. Again, this is fixed. Microsoft tech verified my key as being legit, otherwise he wouldn't have reactivated it for me.. I'd just like to know how this happened.

Not sure why you would ask, as I obviously wouldn't have bothered to make this thread if it wasn't a legit copy. No offense. Just saying..


EDIT - The program was called Magical Jellybean. Just remembered.
 
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If the installer is working properly it will pick up the key from your machine's bios and not even ask you for it. There is a problem however, if you have a Windows 8 key in the BIOS and you try and install Windows 8.1, because it won't pick it up. What you need to do is install Windows 8 and then upgrade to 8.1 (which is a bit annoying). It sounds like that might be what happened to you. Microsoft support can give you a 8.1 version of your key on request. This isn't an issue in Windows 10 because they've gotten rid of the idea of separate keys for service packs.
 
Well I never had windows 8 and never removed or altered my copy of 8.1 aside from standard updates. Just really odd that it happened all of a sudden out of nowhere. I'm going to assume windows was corrupted somehow, I had been seeing small errors the previous week as well. And this has all been sorted out already as I said, just needed a windows refresh and some time with the MS tech on the phone.

Windows definitely saw me key, it had everything but the last 5 digits starred out and they matched they key once I used jellybean. Windows just tried to say it wasn't legit anymore. Yet when I called the MS tech, he was able to verify that my key was indeed legit and came with my PC. Freaking stupid. Oh well. At least it's all sorted out now.

Thanks for the input.
 
OK, so the reason I asked is that the key you are pulling with MJB is just going to be a generic OEM key that does not activate. I bet if you paste that key into Google you'll find it online because it's the generic key used by that OEM.

Windows 8 and newer OEM machines are going to self activate based on the computers hardware (as already pointed out by Quix). Did you change or alter hardware like the motherboard?
 
Oh I see. No I didn't change any hardware. Maybe something I downloaded fucked with my system. Though I can't think of anything I even downloaded recently aside from buying a mp game on steam. Maybe a windows update or something. Definitely never changed versions though. I did download a fix to get rid of the windows 10 update gui that was annoying that shit out of me a couple weeks ago. Otherwise no change.
 
I had this happen once long ago and ended up blaming it on the dreaded Starforce DRM driver but I can't say that for certain.
 
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