Win 7 preinstalled with download rights: still Free upgrade to Win 10?

Thanks.

Reading over your clean install. 

You said to choose  UEFI first.  I think my BIOS has both UEFI and Legacy.  Does this mean I must go into the bios and change it to UEFI?

The manual says:

•Load Setup Defaults:  Restore to the factory default settings.

Note:Enable OS OptimizedDefaults  to meet the Windows8 or Windows10 certification requirement. When you change this setting, some other settings are changed automatically ,such as CSMSupport,UEFI/LegacyBoot,SecureBoot,andSecureRollBackPrevention.

I don't really understand this?  How should I proceed?

If you upgraded during the free Upgrade period then it almost immediately assigns a permanent Digital License in MS activation servers for your hardware which lasts for it's life.

It does NOT show if you have a Windows 10 Digital License on your PC once you install another OS. The only place it remains is in MS Activation Servers. This is why I said the fastest way to find out is shrink your C partition to install Windows 10 in a Dual Boot, see if it activates, if you want to keep i, get rid of Windows 7, or keep both.

Greg, I was confused.  I guess when I very temporarily updated to win 10, it must have been from windows free upgrade given to everyone at the time, because, as you wrote, I seem to only have win 7 pro via win 8.1 downgrade rights.

At any rate, since I already installed windows 10 (way back when, and very briefly), then if I reinstall, and it activates, then I can assume everything is fine.

I read (from someone online) that once win 10 has been installed on my machine legally, then it's stored on ms activation servers and will reactivate when reinstalled.  I guess this is what you are saying.  I also read (online) that MS is still offering free upgrades to win 10 via win 7 OEM via fresh install anyway.

BUT:

I also read on this site that if I type "winver" in the search box and press enter,  it would state somewhere in that paragraph that I had installed win 10 in the past, but mine does not!

Does this mean that this is a lost cause and I must buy?  I can always just try first...

Also on  this site, hereit says that upgrading is limited to 1 year?  Is this incorrect?

Thanks again for your help...

Microsoft doesn't want to have to manage a billion Windows 10 Product Keys so it created Digital Licensing to store an ID representing your hardware in MS Activation Servers that it checks in with when you reinstall or need to reactivate.

What freeware program are you asking about is legal or illegal? You are in Microsoft Community forums being helped by a senior Moderator and MVP (the highest award in the tech field) for ten years. We do not tolerate anything here that is even questionably legal.

Of course it's legal. You're using Microsoft media to install it, it's connecting to MS servers to find and apply the Digital License. That's as legal as it gets.