How to Backup and Restore Activation in Windows 8

Activating Windows 8 is a piece of cake. But sometimes when you have to reinstall Windows, you need to re-activate it and re-activation is not always so easy. This is why it is a good idea to keep a backup copy of Windows activation ready at hand. A freeware tool called Advanced Tokens Manager can help you backup your Windows 8 activation and restore it whenever needed.

Advanced Tokens Manager is designed by Josh Cell software. It is designed in Microsoft .NET 4.0 which is already present in Windows 8. it is a portable software so you do not have to install anything on your system. All you have to do is download this tool from the Josh Cell software website, extract its contents to a folder and run Advanced Tokens Manager.exe from there. Because this tool saves the activation backup in the same folder from where it is run, it is a good idea to choose a folder where you want to save your Windows 8 activation backup.

Backup and Restore Activation in Windows 8

It would show you the version of Windows 8 installed, your Windows 8 product key and activation status (whether Windows 8 is activated or or not). To create a backup, just click on the Activation Backup button. You would be shown a big message telling you what is required for successful restore. In short, the messages says that the OEM activations require SLIC table, you should not make a big change in your system hardware or the restore might not work, and most importantly, the same drivers should be installed prior to restoring the activation.

If you proceed, the Advanced Tokens Manager would create the backup in a subfolder called Windows Activation Backup, in the same folder as the Advanced Tokens Manager.exe. Now you should close this program and copy the whole folder containing the Advanced Tokens Manager files and the backup in a safe place. When you have to re-activate Windows 8 in future, simply use this same folder and run Advanced Tokens Manager again. This time, it would show an option to restore the backup.

Backup and Restore Activation in Windows 8

You can click on the Activation Restore button to restore the activation back in Windows 8. When you click on this button, you would see a message informing that it would take about 5 minutes to restore the activation and all the network connections would be disabled during the restore process. If you choose to proceed, it will restore the activation to Windows 8 in a few minutes. It might require you to restart Windows after the restore.

Activating Windows 8 for the first time is easy but if you contact Microsoft again, then you have to explain why you have to re-activate it. During the process they blacklist your old product key and give you a new one. Even if Microsoft is very helpful, the whole process may take some time. But if you have backed up your Windows activation, then you can quickly re-activate it in just 5 minutes without having to contact Microsoft. So if you have just bought a brand new Windows 8 PC, the first thing you should do is backup your activation using the free Advanced Tokens Manager.

You can download Advanced Tokens Manager from http://www.joshcellsoftwares.com/