What's the oldest copy of Windows I can get a new key for today? If I had one for W7 or W8 yeah I'd use it, but I don't. Obviously I'm going to have to start seeking out alternate solutions, undoubtedly there are plenty of spare keys to be had. Or as sibling comment suggests look into a minimal Linux install and getting it going under Wine.
But honestly mainly it comes down to that I just kinda expected it to work? I hadn't dealt with Microsoft, or Intuit for that matter, in a very long time. I think last time I did was Windows 7 era and I don't remember it being particularly bad. I sorta just thought, "well, I'll just go get a legit copy of Windows, there's a sale going on even, and it'll have good backwards compat like always and this will all be quick and easy". I mean, clearly you know better, and now I do too, and I'll figure stuff out. This isn't even remotely the most gnarly software I've needed to deal with in the past few weeks. But I didn't expect it to be this much of a PITA either. This is supposed to be a pretty easy glide path, it's not some 18 year old panoramic x-ray imaging software.
Edit:
Oh goodie, reinstalling and just discovered how stupid irritating it is to have a local account under Windows nowadays. "Cut off internet at the right time, hit shift+f10, type oobe\bypassnro, reboot, shift+f10 again, ipconfig /release, close command prompt" ok. Nice. I mean yeah, making an MS account is free, but this is just a VM and I don't want to bother and don't see why I should need to. I guess most people just go with the flow for this but geez.
the good old "it's easier to pirate" issue as usual.
sometimes being a paying customer is undesirable for the company so you just get bad service. it's the same with media if you don't want to just consume the latest mass distributed garbage.
you obviously won't get sued for running old software at your home. so why bother having more trouble to pay when you're clearly not a desired customer.
it's like entering a store and insisting to pay for the free samples and annoying everyone.
But honestly mainly it comes down to that I just kinda expected it to work? I hadn't dealt with Microsoft, or Intuit for that matter, in a very long time. I think last time I did was Windows 7 era and I don't remember it being particularly bad. I sorta just thought, "well, I'll just go get a legit copy of Windows, there's a sale going on even, and it'll have good backwards compat like always and this will all be quick and easy". I mean, clearly you know better, and now I do too, and I'll figure stuff out. This isn't even remotely the most gnarly software I've needed to deal with in the past few weeks. But I didn't expect it to be this much of a PITA either. This is supposed to be a pretty easy glide path, it's not some 18 year old panoramic x-ray imaging software.
Edit: Oh goodie, reinstalling and just discovered how stupid irritating it is to have a local account under Windows nowadays. "Cut off internet at the right time, hit shift+f10, type oobe\bypassnro, reboot, shift+f10 again, ipconfig /release, close command prompt" ok. Nice. I mean yeah, making an MS account is free, but this is just a VM and I don't want to bother and don't see why I should need to. I guess most people just go with the flow for this but geez.