Upgraded to windows 10 and require to reinstall, but I only have win 8.1 recovery disc.

[mdp365]

Last year I bought a hp ab032tx laptop, back then it came with windows 8.1 out of the box. Following the instructions I made the recovery disc. This was before windows 10 launched. Once windows 10 was out, I immediately upgraded to windows 10. Everything is running fine so far, but recently I've noticed the boot times are long, and things take a long time to load. Which is why I wish to change the 1tb hard drive to a ssd (a samsung 850 pro, to be exact). But thing is I want to keep windows 10.  But the installation disc has windows 8.1.  And since I already upgraded I am not sure if my current product key is going to work with windows 8.1. If I download windows 10 from microsoft's website and put it in a pendrive, will it work? Do I have to deactivate my current product key first (if it is even possible that is)? Please help

[DavidPK · Accepted solution]

Hi,

You should be fine and there's no need to deactivate the current installation.

When you upgrade from a previous OS to Windows 10, the activation server registers a hardware profile of your machine - small changes ( such as changing to a ssd ) are almost always fine, whereas more significant changes ( ie swapping the system board ) usually are not. 

I've personally swapped drives several times, then clean installed Windows 10 and there has never been any issue with activation.

As long as your current installation of Windows 10 has activated Ok after the upgrade from 8.1, you can just perform a clean installation as detailed in the guide on the following link.  Note: At the activation screen, select 'I don't have a Product key' - Windows will activate automatically once the installation has completed.

http://www.howtogeek.com/224342/how-to-clean-install-windows-10/

Regards,

DP-K