Retail Media

[Dipsy]

Yesterday while buying a new television set at Best Buy I decided to pick up a retail copy of Windows 10 Pro full version. My son found the box and gave it to me while I was finishing up buying the television. I didn't really pay attention to the box size and when I got home and opened it I found a tiny USB stick instead of the expected DVD. Checked the info sticker on the top edge of the box and it showed English USB. Properties show 6.70 GB used and 7.92 free so I'm guessing the data is not somehow protected from being deleted or erased with an errant click on the keyboard. It would not be laughable to erase a couple hundred dollars worth of data.

I'd like to put the files on a DVD for safer storage and use and I'm curious if just copying the files will make a bootable DVD or if some other process will be required.

 

[Trouble]

I'm curious if just copying the files will make a bootable DVD or if some other process will be required.

Nope.
Doesn't quite work that way.
The actual value in what you have purchased is the product key which I assume is printed somewhere on the packaging or on a card of some type within the packaging.
You can acquire the installation media any time you want, from either of these two resources.
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/techbench
OR
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
After you obtain the ISO then you can use ImgBurn to burn it to a DVD or Rufus to burn it to another USB ThumbDrive, like the one you have now.

 

[Dipsy]

Aha! Thanks Trouble. I hadn't thought of doing that. I wonder if there is anything in the purchased media that might be a little different than the downloadable.

 

[Trouble]

Aha! Thanks Trouble. I hadn't thought of doing that. I wonder if there is anything in the purchased media that might be a little different than the downloadable.

I wouldn't think so.
As a matter of fact, I'm kinda hoping that as time goes by Microsoft might be adjusting their available media from those particular download resource to incorporate the multiple cumulative updates and various and sundry fixes that they rolled out so far.
Probably just wishful thinking.