If you mount 2 VMs (using virtualbox) and use the same ISO of a stripped win 10 will windows still be "legit"? By which I mean will microsoft not detect that there is the same version of win 10 running twice on the same IP (or even worse have blacklisted that ISO upfront) and then block eg. the update function on this win and maybe also introduce pop ups saying you need to register your windows or so?

if that isnt the case and one can therefor indeed go for a stripped win 10 ISO from the web could you please pm me a link to a stripped win 10 ISO? i need the stripping to affect its RAM useage since i care about the VMs using as little RAM as possible so if you might know several stripped win 10 ISOs please tell me the one which uses the less RAM.

thanks for your help!

 

why not go for original install with original iso then kms and strip it yourself with Windows10Debloater script, that way you know your install is clean and up to date

 

Virtual machines have their own "hardware ID" so to speak. It is not the operating system itself that is registered, but rather, the hardware. In other words, activation depends on the hardware (which, on another note, is the reason why you can't just activate Ableton Live Suite on a virtual machine and make a pseudo-portable version to take to college/work... I tried). It doesn't even matter if two computers have the exact same hardware; the "hardware ID" should be different for each computer, and thus should be the case for two VMs.

If your key is linked to a Microsoft account, you can use that account to activate multiple computers. Otherwise, the VMs are basically just two different computers running unregistered Windows (which means they'll have the activation watermark).

And... that's it. Windows 10 is different from other versions of Windows in that the only restrictions to the OS, if it's not activated, are cosmetic (e.g. custom wallpapers, colors, etc.); and even then, you can circumvent this by creating a theme file in another computer and loading it on the unregistered computer.

If you want a stripped down version of Windows 10, either get a normal Windows 10 ISO and run TRON on it, or get Windows 10 Enterprise. Check the piracy subreddit for links to those (only get clean ISOs, no pre-patched). What you could possibly do as well, is download the Windows ADK and create a Windows PE image (which is only 300MB); however, doing this is a bit more advanced/complicated and your software is not guaranteed to work because it's super stripped down.

Hope this helps, and if I made any mistakes please correct me.