alt Hacker NewsRunning unlicensed versions of Windows has historically been pretty easy. Am I missing something with Windows 10 IoT Enterprise LTSC 2021?
With Windows 7, once the evaluation period ran out, you just had to deal with an annoying notification about your copy not being genuine, but it never stopped me from doing whatever I needed to do after installing it on dozens of machines over the years, at this point.
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Yep, last couple of Windows versions I used as desktop OSs likely 7 and 8) were unlicensed and, other than making the desktop background black (sometimes) and an occasional watermark reminder that it's not legit, nothing stopped working.
And using Windows for free still didn't stop me from migrating to Linux exclusively (desktop and laptops and servers), and it's a decision I'm increasingly happy with.
I haven't really used Windows much for years, but doesn't it start shutting down once evaluation period is up? 'Windows will shutdown in 30 minutes unless licence key is added' etc., and the desktop background goes blue with some text about being unlicensed?
Does the LTSC have all the features needed for mainstream programs and games?
1) They’ve started again to crack down on black-market activation methods
https://windowsforum.com/threads/kms38-shut-down-windows-act...
2) It’s not legal, obviously. I’d always have a tinge of worry that if I join a Teams call or something then my employer is on the hook for me doing something naughty.
(given how Microsoft has decided to “upgrade” my local account to a Microsoft account before when logging in to outlook)