Recently, I rebuilt a computer for a friend whose motherboard had died. When it came time for the activation, which I thought had gone through as expected on the initial install, the product key was rejected as invalid. Reading through all of the microsoft support pages on product key activation, not a single one of them pointed to the actual solution, which is to call the following number then do the activation with the support person you reach on the phone, in real time.

support.microsoft.com/gp/contact_microsoft_customer_serv?&fr=1



Because this was not obvious or easy to find using the default activation read me and tutorial and faq pages at microsoft.com, I'm posting this here.

Also, be very careful of scammers who get their sites listed in google, do NOT call any number that you have not confirmed originated on a microsoft.com domain, such as this one. If in doubt, click the link I give above to confirm that this is a valid phone number.
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