Z690 Apex BIOS Flashing and W11 De-Activation Frustrated...Any Suggestions?

[rjbarker]

So the last 2 BIOS Updates I have flashed on my Z690 Apex Board results in W11 becoming De-Activated...I know right, its a first for me.

The first time it happened I went through the "Change Hardware" prompt and it worked no problem.

The second time it happened this same troubleshooting fix wouldnt work and wound up 2 Hrs with MS Customer Supprt and they couldnt fix it for me at the 2nd level of support, after being on hold for another 20 min waiting for the 3rd level of support I gave up and simply "rolled back" W11 to a previous date, this worked!!!

So just flashed bios to beta 1302 and same thing, W11 has De-Activated and Im stumped, no idea how to Re-Activate it , using the troubleshooter gets me nowhere.

It is a legitimate W11 OS purchase from MS Store thru my MS Account.

Why is this happening whenever I flash my BIOS.....is there some setting in BIOS that needs to be something other than defaults in order for me to Activate W11?

Any suggestions would be welcome....Im to the point where I feel like I have to purchase an OEM disk with a Key as this Digital Key from MS is simply causing nothing but grief!!

[bscool]

I have never had that happen with a bios update but I have had to reactivatee when switching MB or hardware. I used the phone activation to get it activated again.

I used the method were they send a txt and activated it thru my smartphone vs doing it via voice/talking.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/product-activation-for-windows-online-support-telephone-...

[TZero]

I've had this problem at some point.
I even bought the license (can install on future hardware) to never go through this again.

But at the time, these BIOS setup tips helped me:








I just don't know if in this new Win11 it will be necessary to reinstall it.

[rjbarker]

TZero wrote:
I've had this problem at some point.
I even bought the license (can install on future hardware) to never go through this again.

But at the time, these BIOS setup tips helped me:








I just don't know if in this new Win11 it will be necessary to reinstall it.

Thanks man.......unfortunately I have already been through all that n my BIOS and have tried changing a few parameters...no luck at all,,,,still cannot Re-Activate ....what a bloody drag....figure I do the right thing, stay away from "Pirate Keys", purchase the OS directly thru MS Account ($185 CDN) and have this now to deal with!!!!
Should have stuck to a n OEM Disk w Key....

2 weeks ago when I went through this I wasted 2-3 hrs of time with MS Customer Support....even they couldnt help thru 2 levels of support.....I hung up while on hold for the 3rd level of support....painful!

I found one other person on the MS W11 Forum having same issue with an MSI Board and could not find a fix.....

[TZero]

One of the things I started to do in all these years of living with hardware/MS Win was to install AOMEI and make a COMPLETE BACKUP OF DISK as soon as I install Windows and so on with each more important change, that is, if there is a problem I do the RESTORE by AOMEI.

I'm going to make a CRAZY suggestion.....as a last resort, I would do:

1) In the safe mode advanced options I would try the option to configure UEFI firmware.



2) If it doesn't work, I would download and do a clean install of Win11 (have the Win10 keys at hand)

[hoodiemike]

call microsoft again, recorded, get the names of the employees you talk to, and get to the maximum level of support on microsoft, when that doesnt work let them know you are perusing legal again against them personally and against microsoft. the community will support it, and microsoft has lost many law suits to their crooked behavior. let us know how it goes, im something of a lawyer so i can help if need be. once it gets popular enough in the media microsoft will settle the suit and likely give you key and some extra money. apart of that settlement, make them change the deactivation and reactivation process

[rjbarker]

hoodiemike wrote:
call microsoft again, recorded, get the names of the employees you talk to, and get to the maximum level of support on microsoft, when that doesnt work let them know you are perusing legal again against them personally and against microsoft. the community will support it, and microsoft has lost many law suits to their crooked behavior. let us know how it goes, im something of a lawyer so i can help if need be. once it gets popular enough in the media microsoft will settle the suit and likely give you key and some extra money. apart of that settlement, make them change the deactivation and reactivation process

Thanks for the feedback......yeah I have tried everything under the sun to Re-Activate and "no go"....

The only thing I can assume now is my OS has become corrupt. I am going to try a Re-install of OS, only this time Im going to install W10 (although the initial W11 install went fine), then go thru the Update process and see if my Digital License activates....then I'll once again try switching BIOS on my Z690 Apex and see if Winws De-Activates again.....a real pita indeed.
The system is running great other than this annoying issue.

I got frustrated 3 weeks ago when I went through this before, was on the phone with MS 2nd Level support with no resolution but to bump me up to 3rd Level support.....put back on hold so hung up.
At each level of support Im asked the same questions ....so yeah it pretty much wears you out.

The original installation was a W11 USB Media that I downloaded and created. While logged into my MS Account I purchased the Digital License and all worked fine initially. The License purchased was $215 CDN.

Anyhow, will see how a clean install goes.

Thanks again

[Blai5e]

I had (for the first time when updating to BIOS 1304 on a Hero Z690) the 2.5G LAN port fail to start with a "Code 10". Tried everything including rolling back to 1003 but the issue remained. Finally, looking in the BIOS, I found "Secure Boot" had magically been disabled and re-enabling it (set "Windows UEFI mode" and the option below it which I changed from "Custom") and the LAN port came to life.

[Saltgrass]

You folks aren't actually showing your OS as Other OS are you?