Introduction: Find Your OEM Key in Your Bios

About: Recent life remod... into the 3 C's... Computers, Camping, Cars, and too many others to list. I had a VW bus, a westfalia, if you don't have one ... you need one. I do.

Many of us have bought computers in the last 5 - 6 years and found to our surprise that they no longer come with operating system installation media?

We are told the the system reserve is all we need… Oh, and besides we are to make a recovery disk and a system backup straight out of the box. Which can take 6 or more dvd’s and we needed to install/set up burning software if we had something powerful enough to handle the system image. Of course this is usually facts that we find out months later when the computer starts having problems. Then we are at the mercy of the media creators. I once bought (and used to make my recovery media) a stack of 100 burnable DVD’s to find that each and every one was bad. I could burn them, verify the data and get no errors. Yet when I needed to access any of those DVD’s they were unreadable. So much for making my recovery media as advised. They say that these disc’s if kept in recommended ideal storage CAN last upwards of 30 years or more. Uh huh, sell me some swampland next please. How many of us store our disc’s in Ideal conditions? No sunlight, even temps, and so on, no touching the read/write surface (finger oils, you know) no sleeves, only CASES!… No, most get put on a shelf or in a drawer, in its case and original box, if we were lucky enough to get one. But more likely a paper or plastic envelope.Under these conditions even professionally made Disc’s lifespans are considerably shortened. Or even worse!! Our hard drive has failed us, Woe is me… all my Pictures, Books, Music, Vid’s of the Grandson….. GONE. But not only that our Operating system reserve, for fixing problems, is also gone. Our key is unreachable in the BIOS. BIOS, what the heck is that?, you ask…. Bios , basic input output system, it is the foundation that runs your computer, the operating system just puts you in the captain's chair. So , new hard drive, not expensive, install it, not hard… but you have no operating system.. What, I have to pay for a new copy?!?!? Noooooooo!!! Doom! Betrayal! You get a disk or an ISO… THIS IS NOT ILLEGAL... you install, only to find what codes you have do not work. They are not the license you paid for, since it is pre-installed and tied to your motherboard in the BIOS.

Dammit I want my key! I paid for it! it’s Mine, Mine, Mine!

You want it?

Here is how to get it in just a few steps, easy right?

Right

Step 1: Here Is How to Get It in Just a Few Steps...

Yes it is, if you have nothing to lose on the machine you need to do this on. If you do, BACK IT UP TO SOMEWHERE SAFE!

Because to get it you have to revert to the Original versions of the operating system you started with. Now a lot of you will be lucky, you have not upgraded or changed operating system, your hard drive is the same one you started with. So you lucky ones can get that OEM key in minutes!

If you are in my situation, I had upgraded, had hard drive issues, and have reformatted (including my system reserve) more than once in the last 3 years. I had to do the research, find the CORRECT information, so I didn’t make it worse. Find the files and codes and bring them all together with a step-by-step, since I will have need to do this for friends and members of family in the next few weeks before Windows 10 is officially released. It took me hours, due to these issues and it being the first time and I wanted to take my take my time and do it right. Considering this was the first part of the task I had set for myself, not the goal.

Step 2: Back Up

Back up your Super* Happy to have it* Important* Data* ...S.H.I.D.

That's right back up your SHID.

I use EaseUs (free for home users) but you can use whatever your preferred method.

Do this carefully, since if you lose your most likely it will include a lot of memorabilia.

Step 3: Gather the Tools

You will need a few small apps,

a USB thumb drive 4 GB or larger capacity

or writable DVD's

The free apps Rufus, and RWEverything

Step 4: If You Are Running the Original Operating System

If you are running the Original Operating System you are free to install RWEverthing., and go straight to find that key.

So, you have it installed open the program and don't run at the sight of all those tabs!

Choose/ click on the ACPI table Tab.

It will open to even more Icons! What the heck?

Step 5: ACPI Tables

Now that you are in the ACPI tables tab, choose/ click on The MSDM Tab. It opens to a crazy amount of Numbers and Letters...

Ignore it all and scroll down to the bottom of the page where it says Data, The very last in the list..

This is your OEM Activation Code

Write it down!

Now you are ready to move one to the real issue you are working, hence needing your real Windows Activation Code.

Enjoy!

"If you are not running your Original Operating System, that is a longer process, and gets its own tut"