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.
Hmm on the last few installs I’ve done (both Win 10 and 11) I just lead the installation to believe I’ll be doing a corporate/domain install & it always lets me create a normal user/password after that. Not necessary to unplug any ethernet/internet or anything of the sort.
It’s always worked for me both at work and at home.
Just to be sure, I spun up a virtual machine to install Windows 10 22H2, here are the steps I went through:
- Boot into the Windows 10 installer, jump into the installer & run through all the initial install steps until we get to the OOBE (Windows 10 out-of-box-experience post installer)
- Select your Region, click Yes
- Select your Keyboard Layout, click Yes
- Skip Second Keyboard Layout (unless you want one)
- Let it keep going, it might restart (mine did)
- At the Account screen select Set Up For An Organization then click Next
- At the “Sign In With Microsoft” screen select “Domain join instead”
- At the “What name do you want to use?” screen enter your new Windows user account name and click Next
- At the Password screen enter a password for your Windows user account and click Next
- Re-enter your password and click Next
- Set up a security question/answer - Or do like I do & fake them all e.g. select a security question then enter random gibberish alphanumeric text - and click Next
- (do the same for all 3 security questions)
- Select your Privacy settings then click Accept
- Accept or skip any customizations you want (I usually Skip)
- For Cortana you can click “Not Now” or “Accept” up to you
Done! You now installed Windows 10 Pro without a Microsoft Account.
6-8 is not a choice I am given. The installer for Windows 10 is a “multi-release” package. It contains all the distributions, so I cannot download the “pro” version or the “home” version.
The multi-release should let you pick the version in the beginning of the installation.
It does not. Once installed, I can “upgrade” by entering my license key. I will write the details as an edit soon.
It did not. Whoops - I already answered this :)
Just to be sure, did you download some strange version of the .iso from some non-official source? Or did you modify your Windows install in some way?
And you’re definitely selecting to install Windows 10 Pro, not something else?
I assumed you downloaded the generic .iso direct from Microsoft at https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10 like most people do. (you can use the browser trick to get the page to give you .iso download options e.g. in Chrome I just hit F12, set the dimensions to something mobile looking, hit F5 to refresh the page, then go ahead & download the .iso)
The generic .iso is indeed a multi with the download option named “Windows 10 (multi-edition ISO)”, that itself doesn’t affect any of the steps above.
Then just use Rufus or similar to create a bootable USB with it.
I installed the most recent installer from microsoft. There’s only one and it covers all the versions.
Earlier today I managed to get it to work by turning off Wi-Fi in BIOS. I’m going to put a brief writeup as an edit to my original message sometime in the next several hours.
Just unplug the LAN cable, go back one step in the dialog, then forward again. There then should appear the option to make a local account.
Copy-pasting my own old answer.
Choose any of these 3 options:
A. Shift+F10 (opens cmd) >
OOBE\BYPASSNROB. Continue until getting to creating account
B.1. Account >
123@123.com/test@test.com/a@b.com/1@1.ru/fuckoff@microsoft.com/a@outlook.com/d@d.d/na@na.comB.2. Password > *enter any random password*
C. […] > How would you like to set up this device > Set up for work or school
With an existing system:
• CMD >
net user /add *BTW, I heard that you can use any invalid email address, but I never tried it myself.
Neither of these worked. I know now that was because the installer had installed itself on the boot partition with the Wi-Fi info, so I could not go back and force it to continue without a connection. Plus, all addresses I chose it just told me it’s already used, try another.
Enter [email protected], and enter any password. Setup will say something went wrong and let you create a local account.
“[email protected] is already a Microsoft account. Please try a different email address”, so it doesn’t work.
You’re trying to make a new account? There should be an option to log into an existing one.
I’d rather not be forced to link everything that happens on this installation directly to me.-
Yeah, you “log in” to the fake email, which causes an error and allows you to create a local account.
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.
deleted by creator
Thanks for the tips in this post, very helpful!
Instead of an MS account, join a domain and use the domain account to log in. You can set up a domain with Samba.
You just need to select to “Domain join instead”, there is no need to actually go & set up an actual domain. See my other comment.
I’m not given the option. I’m going to have to wipe the drive and start over. I will try using Rufus this time.
Did you get this sorted? I know the following works on 11, and it wouldn’t surprise me if it worked on 10.
First unplug the Ethernet cable, and when it asks for WiFi, press “Shift + F10”. In the opened command prompt type “OOBE\BYPASSNRO”. This will make the installer go to the legacy OOBE (Out Of Box Experience). Finish setup, before finally connecting to the internet. Don’t worry you’re not doing anything dangerous. It’s a simple registry edit.
That did not work on 10.
Everyone here should check out Windows X-lite. No accounts required, disabled telemetry, deleted bloatware, options to delete defender and edge before install. You gotta even install .net and c++ redistributables your self. It feels like being on Windows XP again.
Install Windows 10 LTSC which you can get from massgrave.dev.
This one you can setup without an account.
I’d rather not risk a hacked install if I can. I’ll keep this in my back pocket, though.
LTSC isn’t hacked, it’s an official LTS version
ok, thanks. I’ll check it out, though I solved my problem this time around.
Use Rufus to make a local account
- Install Rufus
- Get a Windows 11 .iso
- Get a 8gb USB (you will need to format, so move your files from inside your USB, otherwise it will be lost)
- Use rufus, select windows 11 iso, select USB, choose Local account + name
Optional: disable privacy option ON
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?
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 😂
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.
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.
Couldn’t you just use the web app?
No. It does not like Firefox for Linux.
Have you tried it in Chromium?
