Unable to Activate Windows 10

Windows 10 Activation Screen Hangs

Symptom:
1. On and off, Windows 10 requires you to reactivate it.
2. You frequently will get this product is not activated displayed on bottom right of screen above Windows clock.
3. In "Start > Settings > Update & Security > Activation" the screen freezes and unable to click anything such as "Activate" or "Change Key".
4. How to activate Windows 10 manually?

Solution:
1. Use manual activation in command line (Windows Software Licensing Management Tool aka. slmgr).
2. Windows Key + F and type "CMD".
3. Right click on Command Prompt and select "Run as administrator".
4. Type "slmgr /ipk <Your Windows Key Here> and hit Enter. This is to insert the product key manually.
5. Type "slmgr /ato" and hit Enter. This is to activate the product key online.
6. It will tell you Windows successfully activated if all's successful.

Run Command Prompt as Administrator

Use slmgr to change product key

Use slmgr to activate product key online

Windows 10 Update Causes Host Network and Hyper-V Network to Stop Working

Unable to Enable Network Device for both Host Network and Hyper-V Network After Windows 10 Update

Unable to Enable Hyper-V Network Device

Symptom:

1. After updating Windows 10 to the latest build, host machine looses connectivity to LAN.

2. Virtual machines in Hyper-V still has connectivity to LAN but host machine doesn't have have connectivity to LAN.

3. In Network Connections, Hyper-V network device is disabled and cannot be enabled.

Solution:

1. Perform this in elevated administrator rights.

2. Windows Key + F, enter "cmd".
3. Right click on CMD and run as Administrator.

4. Enter "devmgmt.msc" to open up Device Manager.

5. In Devie Manager, uninstall both physical NIC and virtual Hyper-V NIC.

6. Scan for hardware changes.

7. Physical NIC will be reinstalled automatically.

8. Open up Power Shell in elevated administrator rights.

9. Windows Key + F, enter "powershell", right click run as Administrator.

10. Enter "Get-NetAdapter" in PowerShell to list physical NIC.

11. Create a new Hyper-V virtual network device.

12. Enter New-VMSwitch "vSwitch" -NetAdapterName "Ethernet" -AllowManagementOS $True

* vSwitch = desired name for your Hyper-V virtual switch and Ethernet = name of your physical adapter.

13. Enter "Get-NetAdapter" again to view newly created virtual adapter.

14. Go back to Hyper-V Manager.

15. Open Virtual Switch Manager to verify the newly created virtual switch is in External Network > Physical NIC mode.

16. Check virtual machine settings to verify they are mapped to the newly created virtual switch.

17. Verify virtual machine is able to access LAN.

Uninstall physical NIC, Hyper-V NIC, and scan for hardware changes

PowerShell commands

Hyper-V Manager

Virtual Switch Manager