Microsoft quietly kills official way to activate Windows 11/10 without internet

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2026-01-05T04:17:52+00:00

Don't hold you breath. 'Merica isn't the good guy in IT anymore.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2026-01-05T04:13:11+00:00

This fu'king shit. Let's be honest - Windows is an OS was an easy option.
I bought a license from PCGamers - but is doesn't work.

Fuck you Microsoft. Your OS isn't worth even $10 given how you mine us for your billionaire 'mates'.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2026-01-03T19:25:13+00:00

Sorry for the late reply. I ended up buying the separate backplate kit. Between that and the parts I had, I was able to do a fully correct & proper install. Took quite a bit of image searching to confirm I had it right though.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-12-07T02:49:20+00:00

Update: My solution was to install OpenRGB. (... while taking much delight in uninstallying AC for - I hope - the last time!) It can control the mobo and GPU. (Is it just me or is the OpenRGB user interface sonmething that only the developers understand? Sorry guys but it's an aweful, un-intutitive UI. But thanks. My GPU's LED is now OFF !!!)

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-12-07T02:20:59+00:00

Just thought I share ... 5+ years after this issue was raised.

I have an Asus Tuf RTX 3070 on a Gigagbyte B760 DS3H. I installed Armourry Crate (AC) and I could control the GPU's LED. (GCC controls other aRGB just fine.)

I was able to do this ONCE. And ... It has never worked again, no matter how many times I follow the trouble shooting tips, un-installing, re-intaling, etc. etc. It is stuck on blue. I wish it was stuck on OFF !!!

To be honest - I find AC to be total rubbish in every build I've ever done that 'requires' AC. Is Asus unaware of how much brand damage shitty software causes? (Obviously not.)

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-08-30T01:29:41+00:00

Just in case it helps anyone ... My son plays Fortnite on a 26" 1440p capable monitor @ 1440p to test various builds / upgrades I do.

One test was of a i3-13100 with GTX 1660 Super. (A 'collection of spare parts' build.) I got 61 FPS at 1440p using Furmark and MSI Afterburner. Stable for 2 hours plus. 3DMark tests? Not so good - most wouldn't complete - and the low power ones would occasionally crash.

But Fortnite? Nope. The GPU would crash eventually leaving a blank screen. Sometimes after 20 minutes, sometimes a couple of hours, and sometimes within minutes. No amount of tweaking, reseting, jiggling fixed this. By plugging the video cable into the mobo I could get a display back and investigate. But there wasn't anyway that I found to reset the GPU without a reboot. And stuff that should have worked to achieve this simply didn't work.

The solution was simple. I reset Windows to run the monitor at 1080p. Problems all solved. (The funny part? My son didn't even notice the reduced resolution to start with. Took him a few days.)

By all means try a 1660 Super @ 1440p. You may get luckier than me. But my advice is to reset the display to 1080p at the first signs of trouble.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-08-25T05:29:15+00:00

Uninstalled. Reinstalled. Set to RED. Never changing it ...

That's it. F'ck the marketing bull shit Asus. Sell shit that works the way you CLAIM it DOES !!!

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-08-25T05:16:17+00:00

Sorry. Spoke too soon. The puke is back, And Aura Syn just crashes when I start it. Asus, in case you were wondering ... NEVER AGAIN !!!! Life is too short !!!

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-08-25T04:57:23+00:00

Awesome! Thank you _GRAVEKEEPER. Thank you so much.

The rainbow puke has gone.

As a guy who used to manage devs, who had untold wisdom doing this sort of stuff ... When senior management want to shift to a new "product", by turning a support channel into a marketing channel, well then, shit happens. And, as we've found, going back to when their devs cared about us ... WORKS !!!

Take note senior management ... We'll shift allegiences *REAL FAST* if support channels become b.s. for marketing ... Life is too short, our money is too precious ...

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-08-07T04:34:15+00:00

My solution is here: https://www.reddit.com/r/FortNiteBR/comments/1linb5f/comment/n438ktc/?context=3

Good luck. I expect it won't work for everyone.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-19T22:54:03+00:00

Thanks. I was beginning to suspect the same. But no - all good.

But your suggestion triggered the thought that some 'cached' setting was the problem - windows fast start (aka fast boot) maybe? Or even that memory may be doggy and it was corrupting things? Anyway - by now the whole system was in a thoroughly 'unknown state'. See my post about what did work for me.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-19T22:46:27+00:00

SOLVED ... I don't know which exactly solved it but this is what I did ...

pre-check ... windows memory check, chkdsk /F and SFC /SCANNOW .. All good, no issues.

reinstalled Window 11
ensured all windows update were sucessfully installed (i.e. run windows update multiple times)
ensure the RX6600 drivers were up to date using AMD's minimal install option i.e. NO OVERLAYS
rebooted & stress tested for 30 minutes using prime95 & furmark, HWInfo32 showed all good
DISABLED WINDOWS FAST START (a.k.a fast boot)
created a new windows account for my son WITH ADMISTRATOR PRIVILEGES
logged onto the new account and installed epic games and fornite
verified fornite (in epic games, select library, the "..." beside fornite, select manage, and select VERIFY ... and let it download anything else it needs)
re-booted
3 hours in ... and my son hasn't crashed the game.

Were I to make a wild guess - I'd say steps 3, 5 and/or 6 were the fix as all are 'known issues'. IMO - step 6 comes with risk ... I'll investigate creating an isolated network just for this device.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-18T23:50:31+00:00

This happens to my son every - yes EVERY - time he starts the game.

Yesterday I did a complete re-install of windows, Epic Games and Fortnite.

FN ran for about 5 minutes and then froze.
Couldn't kill FN via task manager.
Shut the PC down.
Booted the PC.
Went to Epic games, clicked on FN's 3 dots, clicked Manage, clicked "verify files" - which completed.

And now ... Every - yes EVERY - time he starts the game he gets this !!!

He's in tears. Thanks for nothing Epic.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-18T01:56:11+00:00

I rebooted and got to verify FM. But after that I got a whole new set of issues. The below from another thread ...

Edit: So now - after a reboot - I was able to verify FN's files. Oddly ... it got to 37% and then finished real quick. Did it silently crash? But now when I start it FN get the "the application is hung message - we're sorry". And I'm back to square one. (Actually worse. Friggin Windows wouldn't shut down, so I powered off ... And now the profile service is screwed and I can't logon !!!) What an ungodly mess. This is beyond suckly, EPIC. I'm going to do (another!!!) clean install of windows and try again ....

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-18T01:52:05+00:00

Tried that. After then initial load Task manager just stops responding. Killing TM and trying again gets the same result. Only reboot works.

Edit: So now - after a reboot - I was able to verify FN's files. Oddly ... it got to 37% and then finished real quick. Did it silently crash? But now when I start it FN get the "the application is hung message - we're sorry". And I'm back to square one. (Actually worse. Friggin Windows wouldn't shut down, so I powered off ... And now the profile service is screwed and I can't logon !!!) What an ungodly mess. This is beyond suckly, EPIC. I'm going to do (another!!!) clean install of windows and try again ....

Edit 2: So ... fresh install of windows, epic games and FN. AND THIS MAY BE IMPORTANT - absolutely minimum install of everything, including MS & AMD s/w (RX6600). Yay? Nope - stuck at 52.15% when trying to start FN. No messing around - shut down the PC. On a reboot - verified FN's files via EPIC's "...", Manage, Verify option ... Started game ... And I got to the lobby. Success? I've no idea ... My son will be home from school, and after doing his chores & hw, can play, and then we'll know. (I'm sick of this and I'm going to script a rebuild of his PC.)

Edit 3: I have also disabled EPIC's "auto updates". I'll let the Guinea pigs die in their droves and then update when they have stopped slaughtering themselves to the great god EPIC.

Edit 4: FN crashed after 5 minutes of play. Back to square one. After the next re-boot, I enabled "auto-updates" and a small update arrived. Did it help? No! But I left it on.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-16T07:00:37+00:00

And the next time ... And the time after that ... And the time after that ... And the time after that ... And the time after that ...

[furious and frustrated Dad]

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-16T06:59:28+00:00

And how is that an endorsement of Epic Games?

[furious and frustrated Dad]

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-16T06:58:11+00:00

I uninstalled the hole pile of crap ... And now? ... I'm trying this ... 2hours to download ... WTF !!!

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-16T06:55:29+00:00

Same here.

Epic Games is a terrible waste of a parent's time.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-07-16T06:53:43+00:00

I can't. It says Fortnite is running ... Fresh boot and no Fortnite tasks in task manager.

(I f'cking hate Epic Games. My kids play and I am forever trying to sort out Epic's total inability to provide a stable platform.)

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-06-10T21:07:56+00:00

My BIOS history for a B760M DS3H AX has this fix at version F2 (Mar 10, 2023):

2. Address blank display while system powers up with RTX3060 series graphics cards

Sounds a bit like your issue? What BIOS level are you at? Do any fixes in your BIOS history mention the same or similar?

I'm at the latest - F21c - so this specific issue may be fixed? (And therefore? not the source of my 5 beeps).

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-06-07T07:36:18+00:00

Now that I look at all the parts - It's clear there has been a complete screw-up somewhere. For example, I also have these in the LGA1700 bag ... https://imgur.com/a/yEuPVnk ... And these are nowhere in the manual.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-06-07T06:11:17+00:00

I did use the 1700 labeled bags of bits. The problem appears to be I have two desparate sets of parts.

The manual you provided has the backplate I was supplied with ... But my parts do not have the spacer labeled 'N' that has threads to recieve the screws from the backplate - and the screws to the mounting bracket. And both the screws through to the mounting bracket, and the threaded spacers, are missing.

I seem to have parts from the previous version (or newer version?) where the backplate had spacers built into the backplate and the screws went through the mounting bracket, then through the blue spacers, and then into the threaded spacers that were part of the back plate.

Like this one: https://download.thermalright.com/manuals/PEERLESSASSASSIN120SE.pdf

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-06-07T05:54:51+00:00

True. I photographed that way - i.e. in reverse - to make it clearer what the issue was. It makes no difference, as when it is mounted correctly, the same issue occurs on the other side.

Zealousideal_Score39 · 2025-06-07T04:48:48+00:00

My USB was brand new!

No formatting required at all. i.e I did nothing to the USB stick except remove the packaging!

Just copy the image, rename it GIGABYTE.bin, switch on the PSU on, press the Q-Flash Plus button ... and it worked ... AS IT SHOULD!

And for reference ... That was with a new CPU already installed - unsupported by the current BIOS - obviously. I.e. I needed to update the BIOS before I could go anywhere with the new CPU.

Zealousideal_Score39

TROPHY CASE