Installing Windows on Laptop- New License(?)

Hey All

So my personal laptop is dying. It’s getting pretty old and just seems unstable lately, and needs to be plugged in at all times

I have an Thinkpad from my last job. I was a remote employee and as it was a small company they didn’t want it back. This laptop is only about 2 years old.

It already has Windows, but it’s the full disk image of that old employer, complete with VPN, etc. So I think the right thing to do is get my own Windows and start fresh.

How do I do that? I’m by no means computer illiterate, but since I don’t own the license for what’s on there, I’m not going back to original but starting over. Is there a legal way similar to when I’ve put Ubuntu on other machines (I downloaded a installer onto a USB, interrupted the startup, and followed the instructions)?

In the old days I’d have put the Windows DVD in there and install, but now I have neither a DVD nor a DVD Drive…

Thanks

You can buy brand-new Windows license keys from the Microsoft store online, if that is your question:

https://www.microsoft.com/software-download/windows11

That’s not going to rejuvenate a Thinkpad battery, though. You may need a new one if it’s dead.

BTW, Windows is not necessarily going to work better/with higher performance than Ubuntu; it depends how you are going to use the laptop.

You may not need to buy a new license. I recommend going to that link above to download the Windows 11 ISO installer (or even the Windows 10 ISO installer). The page explains how to put the installer on a USB stick. Since the computer was previously licensed for Windows, it may activate cleanly.

I realize what I wrote wasn’t clear, sorry.

My personal laptop is not the Thinkpad. It’s an HP and it’s dying. I have a Thinkpad “leftover” from my last job and I wanted to put my own Windows on it. I just wasn’t sure how to physically do that without a DVD, and wondered if it was LIKE Ubuntu with the USB drive installer; also trying to show that I wasn’t entirely illiterate in that I have installed Ubuntu in the past.

Thanks to both. Will a fresh install wipe all the software unique to my old employer in the process?

If you pick the right option. It’s been a while but one of the options preserves data on the drive. You want to select the one that formats or wipes the drive.

I buy Thinkpads secondhand that were owned by companies. They usually have a label on the underside that indicates it is already licensed for Microsoft.

I just install a Windows ISO from a usb drive installer. There is a Microsoft USB creation tool for this purpose.

Yes, as others have said, if Windows was installed with a valid license in the past on this machine, it will install freshly on the same machine and automatically activate again. What wouldn’t work is to transfer “your Windows”, as you put it, from the old machine with all settings and installed programs to the new one. I don’t see a way for that.

Yeah, you might luck out and the machine itself is licensed at a hardware level since it was a work machine. I’ve refurbished old office Dell Optiplex boxes with a fresh SSD and fresh install of Windows and it auto activates just based on the board BIOS and chip.

Worst case scenario, you could just run Windows unregistered for a while. You get a nag in the corner and lose some functions but it broadly just works. Not a long term solution but maybe you’re waiting on a sale price.

Thanks to everyone’s help. Filmstar’s video was helpful and now I have the laptop working just fine.

I was never asked to enter a license key, and I’m not getting any reminders, so I assume that is that.