Windows License duplicated - accidentally

[Agonizel]

Hey community,

 

A few months back, a friend of mine wanted to upgrade. He bought whole new parts which I selected and then I built his PC with him.
The only thing we conserved from his old PC was the windows license.

This is how we "transferred" the windows license: We took the (C:) Drive of the old PC and connected it to his (at the time) new B350 motherboard. Then I booted on a thumb drive on which I had prepared a windows installer via the windows tool. After that, I wiped his old (C:) Drive clean and proceeded by installing windows on his new M.2 Nvme drive. We then screwed the old SSD (the C-drive) back into the old computer.
Finally, I re-activated the old windows license key on his new computer after booting into windows desktop as the windows installation was complete.

 

Now here's what happened:

My friend is now giving his old PC to his little brother. I replaced the 270x with an RX580 so it could run present games better and I had also a windows installer prepared on a thumb drive. Since I had wiped the (C:) Drive, I thought I would land in the BIOS or Boot options by default upon turning on the computer - but no.
Actually, the computer booted into windows. Windows "repaired" itself and then proceeded to simply boot on a windows desktop: I checked system info which told me that "Windows is activated with a digital license linked (...)"

 

I reset windows just to be sure, it took 2 hours. In the end, even after windows was re-installed - windows still considers the license as activated.

Can anyone tell me what actually happened?

[Windows7ge]

As far as wiping the drive I can only assume you didn't really wipe it. Then it just booted as usual, phoned home and saw the key was already in use and reported back that it's duplicated.

[Agonizel]

8 minutes ago, Windows7ge said:

reported back that it's duplicated.

So may it be a matter of time until windows says "hey, on second thought I'm de-activated, enter a new license-key." ?

[Windows7ge]

5 minutes ago, Beer_Nontitju said:

So may it be a matter of time until windows says "hey, on second thought I'm de-activated, enter a new license-key." ?

Assuming Windows 10 you can go to This PC > *right-click* > More (or) Properties > Properties

Bottom of the page will say "Windows activation" and it give you the option to "Change product key"

 

I've never done this so I don't know the process after clicking it but it's there and you can try it.

[Agonizel]

1 minute ago, Windows7ge said:

you can try it.

Alright, but why should I since windows considers itself activated ?
Anyway, I'll update this thread in the next few days to tell if the windows did actually stay officially activated. If it's the case, than that's awesome.

[Windows7ge]

According to what I've been told, keys can be used a small number of times. Though that doesn't mean you can use the same key on multiple machines it means you can move the key to different machines assuming the previous machine is deactivated.

 

If it's working, great. Just don't be surprised if one of the machines deactivate in the following days, weeks, or months.