{"id":134,"date":"2011-11-22T22:08:54","date_gmt":"2011-11-22T22:08:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/?p=134"},"modified":"2012-02-10T00:05:07","modified_gmt":"2012-02-10T00:05:07","slug":"how-to-reinstall-windows-without-having-to-reactivate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/?p=134","title":{"rendered":"How to Reinstall Windows Without Having to Reactivate"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/geekers\/up\/sshot4ea110fa88c43.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><br \/>\nEvery time you format and reinstall your PC, you have to activate  Windows again, which can sometimes be a pain once you\u2019ve done it too  many times. Here\u2019s how to backup and then restore the activation status.<\/p>\n<p><em>Note: <\/em>we aren\u2019t going to cover how to reinstall Windows,  since you should know how to do that already. This article just covers  backing up and restoring your activation.<\/p>\n<h3>Introduction<\/h3>\n<p>Advanced Token Manager easily allows you to back up all the  information that Windows uses to check the validity of you copy of  Windows. Collectively called a Token, this information can be backed up  to an external storage medium. Once you have formatted you can import  the Token and your Windows will be genuine again.<\/p>\n<h3>Backing Up<\/h3>\n<p>Once you have grabbed your copy of Advanced Token Manager from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.softpedia.com\/get\/System\/Back-Up-and-Recovery\/Advanced-Tokens-Manager.shtml\">here<\/a>, you can extract the zip file and then run the executable file.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-217.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"567\" height=\"282\" \/><\/p>\n<p>When the advanced token manager launches, you will see the BIG Backup  Activation button. Click it to begin backing up your token. All the  \u201cBBB\u201d characters are just masking the real product key, don\u2019t worry that  is not your real product key.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-315.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"496\" height=\"431\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Once you click the Backup Activation button, we expect that 99% of  you will be prompted with this message. Unless some of you are ultra  geeky and using KMS at home, you will get this message. You can just  click yes to continue.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-414.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"424\" height=\"222\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Once activation is finished being backed up, you will see a folder  called \u201cWindows Activation Backup\u201d in the same folder that you launched  the token manager from, this contains the backup.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-511.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"459\" height=\"282\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Now we have reloaded Windows on the same PC, as you can see it is not activated.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-671.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"650\" height=\"231\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Now I can run the advanced token manager, this time it will say Restore instead of Backup.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-712.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"479\" height=\"423\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Once you click Restore you will be prompted to make sure you want to do this, click the next button to start the restoration.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-88.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"471\" height=\"205\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Once it has completed a success message will appear.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-97.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"424\" height=\"210\" \/><\/p>\n<p>If you go check your validity in the System Settings, you should have the genuine badge back.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/sshot-106.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"609\" height=\"261\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The advanced token manager can also support Office Activation and works on all versions of Windows 7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Every time you format and reinstall your PC, you have to activate Windows again, which can sometimes be a pain once you\u2019ve done it too many times. Here\u2019s how to backup and then restore the activation status. Note: we aren\u2019t going to cover how to reinstall Windows, since you should know how to do that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-win_7"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=134"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":407,"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134\/revisions\/407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microsoftgeek.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}