4 Ways to Recover Windows Product Key from Unbootable Drive
Method Four
What you need to do is set up a UBCD4Win livecd, boot up the computer with it and run either Joshua’s Key Reader or Keyfinder. Setting up UBCD4Win could take a while, so here’s a guide on how to create your UBCD4Win livecd.
This method has a few major drawbacks over the Hiren method in that you need a bootable Windows install and an XP install CD. This is because UBCD4Win needs to be installed before you can create the bootable CD and also requires a number of files from a genuine install CD.
1. Download UBCD4Win (270+MB) and install it on your computer.
2. Run UBCD4Win.
3. You need to select the source at UBCD4Win. Insert Windows XP installation disc and select your CD drive. If you don’t have Windows XP installation disc but your manufacturer provides a i386 folder in your C drive, then select C:\i386.
4. Insert a blank CD, select Burn to CD/DVD and click Build. The whole process will take a little while.
5. Now to recover Windows product key, all you need to do is boot up the unbootable computer with UBCD4Win. Follow the instructions until you get to a part where it looks like Windows. Go to Start -> Programs -> System Information -> Info. and Diag. Tools -> You can either use Joshua’s Key Reader or Keyfinder
5.a If you run Keyfinder, go to Tools -> Load Hive… and select the Windows folder which is normally at C:\Windows and the genuine Windows Key will be display at the right pane.
5.b If you run Joshua’s Key Reader, click the Read Remote Key button. Same thing as above, select the offline Windows folder which is normally C:\Windows. The Windows Product Key will then be shown.
These methods are confirmed to work on Windows XP, Vista and 7 because we’ve tested them successfully. See, all it took is one CD to do the job. You don’t need to have access on another working computer to decrypt the ProductID, or the hassle of taking out the hard drive and fixing on another computer. Something I would highly recommend is to burn one of these above CD’s anyway because they are great to have already to hand when something like this happens.
Couldnt get HIRENS to load on a USB. ISO2USB would report an error every time I tried. Even after re-downloading the ISO twice.
I think there is something wrong with the way it formats large USB sticks.
So I created a small FAT32, 2GB partition on my (64GB) memory stick (using a second windows computer and Disk management tool); then I deselected the “Format selected USB Device” box since I manually formatted beforehand.
Then hit the process button and it worked.
hello
i bought the lenovo Z50-70 and model number – 20354 for my little brother. it came with Preinstalled windows 8.1 but somehow it crashed and he installed the local windows 7 with random or open to use or what is it called fake product key . Can there be a chance to retrieve my original product key and install the original windows 8.1?
So what can someone with a OEM unbootable computer do? Is there anything? (OEM means you had your computer built on the website, in my case HP, is that right?)
Sorry for being a noob
Read the article I mention below in my reply to “Harsh”.
my hard drive has been crashed but i have license version of window installed for HP and hard is no more working so how can i get the license key installed in it please give a quick reply.
Have a read of this article:
https://www.raymond.cc/blog/backup-and-restore-vista-oem-activation-license/
Tool #3 should help you.
So,
No love for a rubbed off OEM product label on the laptop?
That stinks.
Quite true, if your label rubbed off Microsoft would simply try to sell you a new license. Notwithstanding the fact they changed the design of the sticker from the durable plastic covered XP version to the paper sticker for Vista and above. :(
GREAT!!..THANKS!!.. I turn off my adware blocker for you..
good call on Hirens Boot CD. its a big tool, and I didn’t know it could pull a MS product key. thank you, sir.
Not really so. Hirens Boot CD is half of what it shoud be. It is very good to access a locked hard drive that was locked by a BIOS supervisor password, it is very good to have such a handy windows GUI interface to recover some files. As far as recovering software keys or to reset BIOS passwords is full of software that can brick your BIOS or software that works only on Windows XP. In fact the produkey software works only for XP and not for Win7. The iBios software can brick your BIOS and is badly done. The antivirus programs keep on failing. Only Claim AV did work on my laptop. There is one handy software, NTPWEdit, that is based on Windows GUI that can reset your passwords for the Admin and other users of the Windows OS and It did work nicely for me, it’s simple to use. There is no software to read the product key stored into the BIOS and erase it thus the software pack is making the interests of the industry that wants you to throw into the garbage bin your laptop or PC when the Windows OS you are using it out of service. There is probably some good software in the package like Imgburn and other well known programs however there is also a lot of badly made software. I would give this bunch of software pack a vote of 6. It does not pass the real test quality necessary for a computer expert. It is your right to erase the BIOS records for the product key because at time of purchase of your computer I am sure that the vendor did not advice you about this issue that your computer is not really yours, it belongs to the industry.
This is great!!! Thanks.
Thank you for the write up. I’ve used Hiren’s boot CD in the past (before a bunch of stuff was removed) with great success.
I just wanted to let everyone know this is relevant to Windows 10. I used the built in upgrade which immediately failed on my Alienware M11x laptop with the first generation of switchable graphics (basically the integrated Intel and discrete Nvidia are both connected to the same display at the same time and need a special driver that Windows 8 loved to “update” and immediately crash until I figured out how to disable the specific update). Windows 10 would partially boot and then just hang, I’m assuming upon loading the graphics card. Safe mode (accessible by a hard shutdown 3 times after Windows starts booting, but before hanging) would crash the instant the desktop would display, so I decided to do a reformat, but don’t remember the Windows 8 product key I got from my university (and the Win 7 EULA on the bottom is unreadable anyway), so I needed something to retrieve the product key before reformatting.
Hiren’s also allows me to copy out any files I didn’t already back up off my boot partition since it can access the local drives.
Update: I wanted to reply to this to give the whole story… yes it will pull the Windows 10 product key, but there’s a catch. If you used the free *upgrade* to Windows 10 feature that popped up in Win7/8, then your “product key” is a generated number that will not work for a clean install of 10 (like I needed to do in my situation where the upgrade left me with a non-booting system). That brings me to the point where I was unsuccessful getting into 10 at all (even Safe Mode crashed at the desktop… which was accessible by a hard shutoff 3 times in a row as soon as Windows began booting, bringing up the advanced startup features… F8 was no help).
So before you upgrade, make sure your product key is written down somewhere BEFORE you upgrade, that way if there’s any issues, you can reinstall 7 or 8 then upgrade it to 10. Luckily I had it in my email invoice from when I got Windows 8 from my university, so it was easy, but time consuming.
I’m happy to say that once 10 was running, I really only had to install the funky video card driver and an accelerometer driver to make device manager happy.
Once you’re in 10, you can perform a “reset” that will wipe the drive and do a fresh install.
Universal Boot CD has several programs too powerful for most users to even open let alone try and use.
Just to retrieve Product Keys of programs paid for and Windows O.S. already paid for when bought the computer you own, many safer alternatives.
Bel-Arc – which also informs you just how unsecure your secure pc really is.
Bel-Arc runs in Windows which makes it completely useless when trying to get your Windows key if your OS doesn’t boot.
The article is about recovering your license if you can’t boot into Windows.
THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! Your post saved me so much time!
Thanx …saved me lots of grief.
Unbootable hard drive ..product numbers not known. All revealed and so I was then able to reinstall Windows
Jp
Good one & i appreciate this article because this will help a person when he got a read disaster.
thanks
Good one ray.
Thanks for this info Raymond and many will find it useful.
Nice post!
Thanks!
Thanks Ray for the tip.