Question for anyone who has been part of the MS Insider Program prior to the M1 Macs

[swandy]

This is my first experience being part of the Windows Insider Program and I have a question. I have not activated my Windows 11 for ARM install under Parallels 17. (My current Windows license is for the non-ARM version of Windows 10, which I found out would not activate the Insider Version of Windows 10 for ARM because the Insider Program download is the PRO version of Windows 10.)
From what I have read, if you have a licensed and activated version of Windows 10 on your computer, the upgrade to Windows 11 will be at no cost. How does this effect the people who are part of the Insider Program and have the ARM version of Windows 10? And what about if you upgraded to Windows 11 for ARM like I did?
Sorry if these questions sound stupid but I really have no idea the easiest/best way to eventually end up with a properly activated version of Windows 11 for ARM. (And yes, I do realize that so far Microsoft has not acknowledged that it will sell Windows 11 for ARM except with new ARM devices.)
Thanks.

 

[jdb8167]

This is my first experience being part of the Windows Insider Program and I have a question. I have not activated my Windows 11 for ARM install under Parallels 17. (My current Windows license is for the non-ARM version of Windows 10, which I found out would not activate the Insider Version of Windows 10 for ARM because the Insider Program download is the PRO version of Windows 10.)
From what I have read, if you have a licensed and activated version of Windows 10 on your computer, the upgrade to Windows 11 will be at no cost. How does this effect the people who are part of the Insider Program and have the ARM version of Windows 10? And what about if you upgraded to Windows 11 for ARM like I did?
Sorry if these questions sound stupid but I really have no idea the easiest/best way to eventually end up with a properly activated version of Windows 11 for ARM. (And yes, I do realize that so far Microsoft has not acknowledged that it will sell Windows 11 for ARM except with new ARM devices.)
Thanks.

I don't think Microsoft has said much of anything on how they will support existing Windows11 Arm PCs. The only thing I've heard is that they are dumping support for the Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 because it doesn't support AArch64 8.1.

Microsoft has said that it is likely that x86-64 users downloading Window11 ISOs that aren't supported by Microsoft are not going to get software updates. I wouldn't be surprised if that included anyone downloading an ISO to use on a VM on an M1 Mac.

 

[mj_]

Insider builds do not contain a valid license and have a built-in expiration date. Accordingly, you cannot activate a Windows Insider build with a valid Windows license, and Insider builds are to be used for evaluation and development purposes only and not in production environments.

As for Microsoft's plans to sell Windows 11 for ARM you'll have to wait and see. They haven't announced anything yet.

 

[Digitalguy]

Insider builds do not contain a valid license and have a built-in expiration date. Accordingly, you cannot activate a Windows Insider build with a valid Windows license, and Insider builds are to be used for evaluation and development purposes only and not in production environments.

As for Microsoft's plans to sell Windows 11 for ARM you'll have to wait and see. They haven't announced anything yet.

False. I did activate my Insider version of Windows 10 pro (on Arm) with a regular licence key. My VM is no longer nagging me for activation and Windows is activated. The fact that builds have a expiration dates doesn't mean that you cannot upgrade to the next build... there is no kill switch. There is simply no way of not being Insider with Windows on Arm outside of Qualcomm chips, that doesn't mean you cannot activate your insider copy.