Skip to main content

No Free Windows 10 Upgrade For Pirates

Microsoft: Sorry Pirates, No Free Windows 10 Upgrade For You

PC running on pirated Windows? You won’t get a free upgrade to Windows 10, contrary to what you might have heard in the past. Microsoft confirms pirates won’t get the upgrade, but will have “special offers” to attract them to start paying for Windows 10.
Microsoft has made its final word on non-genuine Windows devices. They will not be eligible for a free upgrade to Windows 10 when it becomes available this summer.
Terry Myerson, chief of Microsoft's operating systems unit, says in a blog post that owners of devices running on non-genuine Windows 8.1 devices will not be able to receive the free upgrade to Windows 10, despite earlier statements he made that Microsoft is planning to "re-engage" users of bootlegged Windows computers, millions of which are believed to be found in China.
"While our free offer to upgrade to Windows 10 will not apply to Non-Genuine Windows devices, and as we've always done, we will continue to offer Windows 10 to customers running devices in a Non-Genuine state," Myerson says.
This could mean that Microsoft plans to continue pushing regular notifications to users of non-genuine Windows to convince them to upgrade to genuine Windows 10 in the form of nagware. Non-genuine Windows will also have a watermark informing users that their devices are running on a pirated copy, and although Microsoft has issued updates even to non-genuine software in the past, Myerson says the unofficial copies have a "high risk of malware, fraud, public exposure of your personal information, and a higher risk for poor performance or feature malfunctions."
At the same time, Microsoft also plans to attract non-genuine users to upgrade to Windows 10 with a bunch of promos that will be launching in partnership with device manufacturers, though no details are available yet.  
"We are planning very attractive Windows 10 upgrade offers for their customers running one of their older devices in a Non-Genuine state," says Myerson.
Users of non-genuine Windows are not always guilty of piracy. In many instances, such as in China, users unknowingly purchase devices running on counterfeit software that its sellers pass off as legal, a reality that Microsoft itself and device makers know to exist.
"Microsoft and our OEM partners know that many consumers are unwitting victims of privacy," says Myerson, "and with Windows 10, we would like all of our customers to move forward with us together."  
In March, Myerson announced at the Win HEC technology conference in China that it is making the one-year free upgrade to Windows 10 available to all qualified PCs, even those running on pirated software. This he also confirmed to Reuters and The Verge, saying that Microsoft believes that "customers over time will realize the value of properly licensing Windows and we will make it easy for them to move to legitimate copies." 

Stay connected for more latest updates...

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Voice Calling Test

Which voice calling app uses the most data per minute? We tested the top 10 Free voice call apps, which use data to place calls, can offer a cheaper way to keep in contact with friends abroad and come to the rescue when you’ve used up your monthly minute quota. However, with multi-gigabyte data plans still often coming at a premium price, the busiest chatters out there could soon eat into their monthly allowance using voice over data calls. To shed some light on the issue, we’ve gone back over our list of  10 free call apps  to investigate just how much data these apps end up consuming. In the list you’ll find popular apps such as Hangouts, Skype, WhatApp and Viber, as well as regional favourites including Line and Nimbuzz. The test method For our test, we subjected each of these 10 apps to three separate one minute calls and recorded the amount of data used by the app after each call. These three totals were then averaged together to produce the result. Bo...

Microsoft Aims To Kill Google Chromebooks

Microsoft Aims To Kill Google Chromebooks With $149 Windows 10 Laptops Despite a lacklustre start, Chromebooks are becoming relatively popular in the super-budget end of the portable market. This has worried Microsoft for some time. After all, with a Google-centric experience, not to mention an operating system in the form of Chrome OS, there’s little if anything to be gained here by Microsoft and everything to lose. That’s why it’s targeting the Chromebook specifically, with a most likely Windows 10-based  $149 laptop. They’re no MacBook killers and don’t expect them to play GTA V, though  (when it finally makes a PC appearance that is). According to tech rumour site www.Digitimes.com , these laptops are geared primarily towards emerging markets, education and the super-low end market, which includes users whose tasks are limited to web browsing, word processing and social media use. The Chromebook has gained traction in quite a few areas and Micros...

Spartan Vs. Rest!!

Spartan For many, it’s not exactly a confidence booster that Microsoft’s forthcoming new browser will be a “Windows App,” rather than a traditional desktop application. It sports the characteristic borderless frames and blockily minimalist aesthetic, and the overall impression is of a stripped-down, simplified version of IE, according to an initial appreciation by Network World’s Howard Wen. ( "First Look: Microsoft's new Spartan browser for Windows 10" ) But, in a lot of ways, that’s probably a good thing – Chrome’s got a very similar look and feel, and it’s doing pretty well for itself. Spartan appears as a Windows app Chrome So what about the browser Spartan’s trying to knock off of its perch? Chrome’s still got major advantages over the rest of the field, including a perceived performance edge, simple and elegant design, and tight integration with Google’s wildly popular web services like Gmail. Simplicity is key for Chrome For the moment, those features...