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Questions tagged [kms]

KMS stands for Key Management Services by Microsoft. KMS allows volume license customers of Microsoft Products to establish a server to hand out software product keys, thus eliminating the need to hand enter product activation keys each time a new operating system is installed.

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Can you configure multiple KMS hosts in a primary / secondary relationship?

We have two datacenters in our environment: primary and DR. I need to deploy a KMS service, and to be proactive, I would like to have a host in both datacenters. From what I have read, you can have up to 6 hosts without calling Microsoft, and it…
Mark Hall
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Change Windows from KMS client to Azure AD activation?

Is there a known way to change existing Windows 10/11 devices from KMS client activation to Azure AD Education A3 / A5 or Enterprise E3 / E5 license activation? Apparently when Windows 10/11 devices are being imaged and joined to Azure AD for pure…
Dale Mahalko
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Activation with KMS with other domain not working

On standalone computers for which I want to activate the Windows 2016 and 2019 license I have set the KMS domain with: slmgr.vbs -skms-domain DomainFQDN When I type, on the computer which I want to activate, the following command line, it returns…
Luke
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Win2012 server R2 KMS host doesn't activate Win10

I have to create a KMS infrastructure in my company: I've read loads of MS docs and how-tos, I've searched the net but I'm still unable to make it work as expected. DNS is configured properly, returning the server name for SRV requests on…
Marco
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Unable to Activate Windows EC2 instance via KMS

I have an EC2 Instance Windows Server Datacenter 2008, and I'm getting an "Unable to Activate Windows" message. Even after following through the instructions here
Dave Beer
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Windows KMS licences in a restricted network

TL;DR: is it possible to install some kind of local kms activation proxy, so the clients could only talk to the proxy, and the proxy will forward the activation request to a kms server which can not be reached by the clients themselves? At our…
Tobias
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KMS activation without DNS

I'm loading a small sized isolated lab with Windows 7 and Office 2013. There are enough hosts to use KMS. In addition the lab does not have DNS as a service available, every host will use a static hosts file. The lab environment will not have access…
pacmanwa
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Can't activate volume license Office 2013 installed on retail Windows 7 via KMS

I have a KMS host in my environment running on Windows 7 Enterprise. It is configured to activate all volume licensed editions of Windows and below and Office 2013 and below. It has received the minimum number of activation requests for both Windows…
JKolb
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About to setup KMS server for Volume activation

I have searched and searched for any hints of how i should setup our KMS server for our coming installations of 2008(r2) servers and win7 clients. No luck, so here I am. We've got around 20 developers switching to windows 7(about 50-80 more boxes…
MrTimpi
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Broken activation of Windows Server 2012

I inherited non-activated Windows Server 2012 Standard. So I purchased retail version "OEM Win Svr Std 2012 R2 x64 CZ 1pk DVD 2CPU / 2VM" and tried to activate it with product key. With this key, I get an error "This key cannot be validated. Try a…
mkudlacek
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Setting up new KMS Host - what is best practice for _VLMCS DNS entry?

I have been tasked with setting up our PDC as the new KMS Host in our environment. I have a question in relation to the DNS entry for KMS Host/s. There is an existing _VLMCS entry in _tcp for the existing host. What is best practice here as im not…
user238651
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Can Windows Server 2008 act as a KMS for Windows 7?

I have been asked to help set up a KMS server for Windows 7 clients on a Windows Server 2008 (R1 SP2) server. Windows Server is licensed separately from Windows 7 (the volume licence is only for Windows 7). Am I right in thinking that this means…
Mark Coleman
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Why won't my Windows 7 KMS key work on my Server 2008 KMS server?

Our Microsoft volume licensing site was recently updated to include our Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 KMS keys. We have an existing KMS server running on Server 2008 (not R2). In an attempt to be proactive about supporting the new OSes in our…
Ryan Bolger
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Word 2013, KMS not activating, looking for clues

I have ONE office 2013 installation among a little more than half a dozen that is not getting activated by our KMS. Funny enough it is on my machine which got reinstalled some time ago - "last" of all, after we redid the KMS (moving it to Server…
TomTom
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Will a Windows 8 KMS key allow older operating systems to be activated?

To put our Windows 8 KMS key onto our KMS server running Server 2008 R2, it appears that we first need to remove the existing Windows 7/Server 2008 key. Is this the case? If so, do the new Windows 8/Server 2012 KMS Keys still allow older operating…
beakersoft
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