installing Windows 10 pro without an account.

It’s been a few years since I’ve needed to install a version of Windows on a PC for personal use. I have a license for Windows 10 Pro, but today I found out it is no longer possible to get through the installation without first creating an account with Microsoft.

I don’t want to do this. Does anybody have any way to get around it? The stuff I’ve read online basically ends up being create your account switch to a local account after installation and delete your account. I want a better solution. Would installing a much older version of Windows 10 work? The whole reason I got an msdn license back in the day is so I didn’t have to do this.

Edit: 10/2/2023

I thank you all for giving me advice and ideas. Much I had already tried before posting my question here, and some suggestions and experiences led me to keep at it. Here’s my experience for others who have a similar problem.

I downloaded the ISO from Microsoft - Win10_22H2_English_x64v1. I used Ventoy to launch the installer. The first time I went through, I connected to Wi-Fi. As soon as I did that, it sealed my fate. By this time in the process, it installed the boot partition on my HD and saved this information so every time I tried to restart the installer, it always went through language, keyboard, then “enter email address”. All the suggestions for fake values simply triggered “This email is already used. Please choose another”, and that was it.

I was getting ready to wipe the partition and try again, but decided to turn off Wi-Fi in the BIOS first to see if that worked. It did. This time it tried to convince me to set up the network and failed and I was able to create a local account.

The way this multi-version installer works is annoying. It installed Windows Home edition, so I had to “know” that I could go to settings and enter a key. Once I put in the key, it “upgraded” to Pro edition, and I was done.

Next time I have to do this, I’ll see if Rufus works. It seems that will remove some annoyance. Either way, I will avoid configuring Wi-Fi until after install next time. I gotta say, I am not looking forward to the day when I must upgrade to Windows 11. So far I’ve been able to avoid actually buying a new copy due to my aging MSDN key. By the time I’m forced to “upgrade”, I might have to cough up some cash for something I don’t want, but am forced to own.

It should be illegal.

Anyway, now that I know I can still use my MSDN key to get an updated Win 10, I feel a bit more comfortable with re-imaging my Dell laptop from dual-boot to Linux only, then install Windows as a VM for these times I need to use it. Fortunately, that is increasingly rare.

Vince,

Enter [email protected], and enter any password. Setup will say something went wrong and let you create a local account.

MagneticFusion,

this

prowess2956,

You can do the same with [email protected]

MasterBlaster,

I did that one before I wrote. It told me it was taken and expected another, so that no longer works. I’ll try the other one mentioned here and report back.

brickfrog,

LOL I didn’t know that works too, good to know :D

Technically you can just click “Domain join instead” to go into the local account creation.

alphapuggle,

You can actually just enter “a” for username & password, don’t even have to make it look like an email

MasterBlaster,

“[email protected] is already a Microsoft account. Please try a different email address”, so it doesn’t work.

Vince,

You’re trying to make a new account? There should be an option to log into an existing one.

MasterBlaster,

I’d rather not be forced to link everything that happens on this installation directly to me.-

okr765,

Yeah, you “log in” to the fake email, which causes an error and allows you to create a local account.

Shaul,

For 10, unplug ethernet or do not connect to wi-fi and it should all you to continue or allow you to skip creating an MS account.

On the one system I use for gaming, before I install 10 which I have done a few times, I shutdown computer, physically unplug ethernet cable, then turn on computer and start the installation process, and I’ve created a local account everytime. Do not plug in cable or connect online until Windows has rebooted to the start desktop with Start menu. If you connect during installation it could force you to create online account.

dingus,
@dingus@lemmy.ml avatar

This is the answer. No internet defaults to local account in Windows 10.

In 11 you can do the same but it requires using Powershell about halfway thru.

MasterBlaster,

This one got me to track down why it never asked for Wi-Fi after I interrupted and restarted the machine. The moment I entered it, the info was saved on the boot partition. Once it tricked me, there was no obvious way out. I turned off Wi-Fi in the BIOS, and that worked.

Shaul,

Did you run a progran to proactive zero out and wipe the whole drive like Parted Magic and then reboot system to load Windows boot media or did you use the Windows installer to only delete the partitions and install Windows again but not actively wipe the drive first?

MasterBlaster,

If I went through the work to wipe the partitions, it would doubtlessly have the same effect as turning off wifi in bios. That would have been my next attempt. It’s more work than disa Ling wifi at the bios level.

shortwavesurfer,

Windows 10 dont connect to wifi or ethernet and it should let you through. I think from what i have heard windows 11 just tells you to fuck off and come back when you have some internet to create the ms account

LazerDickMcCheese,

I made a Win11 machine earlier this year without this issue, but that could’ve changed

Blaster_M,

Win 11 Pro lets you skip MS Account Creation - 11 non-pro does not

Murdoc,

I suppose that means that 10 non-pro doesn’t either? 😬

Blaster_M,

Correct. After a certain year.

damium,

You can still enter audit mode and change some registry settings to switch to a local account. Last time I did an 11 install on a device with Wi-Fi it also let me create a local account after trying to continue with a blank password a few times.

ScrambleVerdict,

I think you can create a local account if you use Rufus to make a bootable USB

Facebones,

Yeah I recall hearing about this, for 11 at least.

MasterBlaster,

I saw that, I will give it a shot. Several other things I tried did not work so I am expecting it to fail, unfortunately.

JackGreenEarth,

Windows is Microsoft’s operating system, and unlike Android, there are fully featured Linux alternatives for all hardware. Why do you need to use Windows, specifically? - noting that needing to use Windows specific software should not be the reason, as WINE exists. You clearly don’t have a specific affiliation to Microsoft, either, as you don’t want to have an account with them. What’s tying you to Windows?

MasterBlaster,

There are times when I do need windows. That is why I kept the default install on my laptop and put Linux on dual boot.

In this case, my son wants to play bedrock Minecraft, and eventually I’m sure he will want to play games that don’t work on Linux.

For recent examples of why I need to have it around just in case, I’m interviewing for jobs and 90% of them use Teams. It took me a few weeks to get a solution to work on Linux.

meiko60,
@meiko60@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

For teams for Linux, this works well github.com/IsmaelMartinez/teams-for-linux

MasterBlaster,

That is what I am using, however I had to find a way to open it when I click on a teams meeting link. After I did that, it would not get past the initial splash. I eventually found that I have to hit CTRL-R one to three times to get it to go to the meeting. See, it took lots of searching and head scratching to get it working.

superkret,

Couldn’t you just use the web app?

MasterBlaster,

No. It does not like Firefox for Linux.

superkret,

Have you tried it in Chromium?

TwilightKiddy,

Nobody asked about ditching Windows, though.

But if you are really interested, for me it’s VR games.

cm0002,

noting that needing to use Windows specific software should not be the reason, as WINE exists.

Lol try installing Visual Studio 22 or even 19 on WINE and get back to me lmfao 😂

MasterBlaster,

Agreed. This is why I took the time to get comfortable with vscode. Still, in real world business development sometes it takes visual studio, and that is an excellent example.

TwilightKiddy,

That is solvable, though.

www.jetbrains.com/rider/

Doesn’t take much time to get used to, and it does most things VS does.

cm0002,

Rider sucks ass for C# development, Jet rains makes some good IDEs no question. But when it comes to dotnet development VS is king

TwilightKiddy,

Why, though? I used both and I wouldn’t say one is strictly inferior to the other.

Facebones,

I forget the command, but you can leave the internet off and run a command in the cmd prompt to disable the requirement.

MasterBlaster,

That did not work for me, and it was listed for Windows 11.

Facebones,

From what I’m seeing you should be able to bypass it just by keeping it offline. I know with 11 once it made me try to login then basically said screw it make a local instead when I had the laptop on airplane mode

Good luck

TheHobbyist,

I tried this just last week with windows 11, successfully:

Disconnect internet, run installation until I needed to connect to the internet.

Shift + F10 to open terminal

Enter the command: OOBE\BYPASSNRO

It restarted install and the “skip now” option appeared to connect online, allowing for an offline account creation.

tomshardware.com/…/install-windows-11-without-mic…

Edit: I now read you are using windows 10 and not 11, not sure if this will work…

MasterBlaster,

It did not, but thanks for the effort!

cm0002,

Go through the account login, put [email protected] for user and something random for the pass. It should try to do something and then say something like Account disabled blah blah create a local account

MasterBlaster,

“[email protected] is already a Microsoft account. Please try a different email address”, so it doesn’t work.

cm0002,

You need to use sign in instead of sign up, it won’t login at all and drop you to the screen to make a local account

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