0

My hard drive crashed suddenly it is toast. I bought a new solid state but the product key on the back from the windows website tells me to go to the Toshiba website and I found nothing helpful there. I had upgraded to windows 10 long ago before the hard drive crash.
Toshiba Satellite L755-S5365

Dan Borreson
  • 1

3 Answers3

2

Since you upgraded to windows 10 your PC is now magically recognised by Microsoft. You can do a clean installation of windows 10 from an USB3* pendrive or from DVD. When it asks for a CoA tell it you do not have one.

Windows 10 should install cleanly and once you have a working connection to the Internet it automatically activates.*2


*1: It does not work with a USB2 pen drive though. It will mention that it needs drivers to continue, except if booted from DVD or USB. But it will not start the installation.

*2: Much to my surprise when I encounted this autoactivation without entering a key.

Hennes
  • 65,804
  • 7
  • 115
  • 169
0

Just use the corresponding version of windows 7 that the COA on the bottom of your laptop is for and it should reactivate as a genuine copy. Once you've done that just run the windows 10 upgrade again, reinstall all of your programs and you should be good as new

Christopher Mathews
  • 11
0

The key on the back of your laptop is likely an OEM key, and you will need the appropriate media for the version and edition (e.g. Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional, etc.), and OEM installation. That's all it should take for Windows to accept the key. Also, if you've already gone through the upgrade process of Windows 10 with that hardware, you should be able to do a clean install of Windows 10 and have it activate successfully.

I'm not sure which part of the Microsoft website you went to, but they only let you download the retail (not OEM) installation media.

If you are bent on installing Windows 7 the way it was from Toshiba's factory, you could try ordering the recovery media here: http://support.toshiba.com/recovery#media

You can also seek out a generic OEM installation disc for your edition of Windows 7. Just make sure you're obtaining it from a non-sketchy, legal source.

BrianC
  • 771