alt Hacker NewsReport: Microsoft kills official way to activate Windows 11/10 without internet
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Thank you, Microsoft, for accelerating the advent of The Year of The Linux Desktop
What does this mean for using Windows in air gapped environments? I would have assumed this was common enough to make Microsoft want to support it.
Is it possible to activate via a web browser on a separate computer, similar to the flow for phone activation?
With both Windows 11 and macOS Tahoe now being non-starters for many, it's clear that we're going to continue to see impressive growth in the Linux desktop in 2026. Last year I migrated my Windows gaming machine to Ubuntu, and it's been a great success. I don't play games that require kernel level anti-cheats, so for me, Proton has worked great. I'm playing new games like Anno 117 on my 2019 vintage RX 5700xt and am having a blast. I'm about to wipe my Windows 10 partition and not look back.
I still have an M1 laptop with a broken screen that is going strong in clam shell mode, but once it dies or I can no longer run Sequoia for whatever reason, I'll be tempted to abandon macOS if Apple can't move beyond the mess they've made with Tahoe.
I have a little AMD AliExpress PC where the Windows installer recognizes neither the wifi card nor the Ethernet port. I guess there's a way to download the drivers on another computer and load them during installation, but instead of figuring out how to do that or what the latest option for circumventing the online requirement is, it now runs Pop OS.
You should still be able to activate windows offline by using the "ZeroCID" or "KMS4k" methods with https://massgrave.dev/chart#basics
If/when support for Linux gaming becomes widespread and easy to navigate with few configuration hurdles, Windows will die very quickly. As for MacOS, I genuinely can't wrap my head around why anyone who is technically competent would prefer that OS.
I have not used windows in a while but thinking of building a PC. Is there a way to install way older version of windows 10 without Microsoft's AI nonsense and the online account requirement?
I do have to say that telephone process was terribly tedious. You had to enter 50 digits or so and it would repeat them all to confirm, ugh.
The way this is going, I'm probably going Linux only next time I upgrade.
When I recently installed Windows 11 on my new rig, it didn't recognize the built-in motherboard wifi and I could only connect after installation of Windows + mobo drivers. How would that work now?
Server 2022 > Windows 11 for desktop OS. No bloatware, less garbage, almost identical driver and application support.
If you think Windows is bad, imagine there are people paying real money to use it.
Is this the last way that was vaguely easy to access? Can you still run the OOBE command or use the XML unattended install method?
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46471081 already posted
I understand why this is bad, but I personally would sign up for a Microsoft account anyway. Mainly, I don't want all my stuff in "C:\Users\micha". Is there a way to set your username?
Next up: Anything running or playing on Windows can be solely distributed, installed and updated through the Microsoft Store.
Actually, I should place a bet on Polymarket for that.
Windows becoming less and less relevant every day and then they do this. 2026 is gonna be true Year of the Linux Desktop.
awaiting what massgrave dev do about this. if nothing, then there's nothing to worry about
I'll never install Windows on another machine.
Microsoft? Nah, it's called Microslop now.
There are activation cracks right?
„just like the gypsy woman said“
what about that mass grave site … asking for a friedn
I read their handheld Xbox is a version of Windows with none of the bloat nor slop. I'm sure they'll never sell that as a version of Windows but I wonder if it's possible to make it into an installable by third parties like other custom ISOs that float around the internet.
The internet recognizes obstacles as damage and hacks around it. ;)
The only official way to activate Windows 11/10 without internet is to insert a linux installation USB stick. Got it.
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The responses here baffle me. This IS GOOD NEWS. HN more than anyone should understand this. Every mistake Microsoft makes with Windows is a free win for Linux. We should celebrate this and encourage Nadella to make Windows as hostile as possible. Add that nasty recall ai spyware, put ads everywhere.
People here hating on Nadella and loving Ballmer are missing the point. This is not a partisan issue. Windows stopped being good a long time ago. Arguably XP was the last good version of Windows.
Windows becoming an OS mostly for corporate types is beneficial for the world. Let us celebrate!
When Nadella took over from Ballmer, he steered Microsoft in a better direction for a while. But by now he's become a lot worse. The biggest software company can no longer produce good software and its products are actively hostile to users. Nadella cares only about one thing, which is shoving AI everywhere and to everyone, at any cost. The irony is that he knows nothing about AI, how to build capable models or how to build useful AI products, nor does he have people who do. AI is his Metaverse: something he's singularity focused on, to the point of neglecting everything else, without any idea what to actually do with it.