How to configure a KMS server in Windows Server 2008 R2 – Ivan’s cloud and security blog (2024)

Well I have had the pleasure of setting up a KMS server in our environment, and found that the documentation from Microsoft is somewhat confusing. In light of this I will write the steps I used to configure the first KMS server in our organisation for use with Windows Server, Windows client and Microsoft Office activation. These steps will only include the installation of 1 KMS server.

Installing first KMS Server

Below are the steps I used to install the KMS server. We determined that due to the number of client activations, and the capacity of our infrastructure we had no problems installing this server on our secondary domain controller. From here on we will call it DC2.

1. Log onto https://www.microsoft.com/licensing/servicecenter/ and fetch your key: “Win Srv 2008 R2 Data Ctr/Itan KMS C” – Note your key may be similar, but either way it must end in either KMS B, or KMS C.
2. On DC2 we run CMD with elevation
3. Type slmgr /ipk xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx where the last section is the Key from your volume licensing website.
   
4. Open “Windows Firewall with Advanced Security” via Start menu -> Administrative Tools.
5. Under Inbound Rules scroll down to “Key Management Service (TCP-In)”, right click and select enable.
6. Reboot the machine – note you can restart the Software Licensing service but I preferred to reboot it (seeing as the server was not in use for anything else)
   [code]net stop sppsvc && net start sppsvc[/code]
7. Activate server after reboot. This can be done via the GUI or by executing the following command from an elevated command prompt:
   [code]slmgr.vbs /ato[/code]
8. Enables automatic DNS publishing by the KMS host by entering the below command in an elevated command promt. Note this should already be enabled, but just in case, we execute the command.
   [code]slmgr /sdns[/code]

Now you are done installing your KMS server.Note this will provide activation for clients and/or servers depending on the KMS key you used to activate DC2. Office KMS activation will be covered in a later section.

I do recommend verifying that the SRV record in DNS is created. Note that you should have no problems with the automatic creation if you are using the vanilla install of AD and have no specific security restrictions in DNS. To verify that the DNS record has been created open up DNS and check. Refer to the screenshot below to see where it lives:

Installing Office KMS Host

As mentioned above we have determined that the one KMS box (DC2) is suitable to do all of our activations for Microsoft products, so now we have to configure the Office KMS host on DC2. To do this we do the following:

1. Log onto https://www.microsoft.com/licensing/servicecenter/ and fetch your key: “Office 2010 Suites and Apps KMS” – Note your key may be similar. If unsure speak to your Microsoft Account Manager.
   
2. Download the Office 2010 KMS Host License Pack from the Microsoft website: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=97b7b710-6831-4ce5-9ff5-fdc21fe8d965. Its only 903kb so wont take too long.
3. Execute KeyManagementServiceHost.exe from your existing KMS server> In our case its DC2. Follow the prompt to finish the setup process.
4. When prompted enter the KMS key for Office 2010.

Thats it. Just as easy to setup. Now you are ready to activate Office 2010 with KMS. To help monitor this, please refer the the section below.

Administering the KMS server

I take it now you want to see whether it works and if clients can be activated. Now i will go into administering the KMS server, which will be quite brief as there is not much to it, and is really only there to aid in troubleshooting, and to have a sticky beak when implementing it. Once its running there is no real reason to keep going in and checking up on it.

All functions to view settings and make changes are done through the already used VBS script slmgr.vbs. To see all the commands simply run slmgr from the command prompt. Note to execute changes you will need elevated command prompt. You will see the following screens:

So the most common command that i used were:

Displays license information (KMS Activation Count)

[code]cscript slmgr.vbs /dli[/code]

Displays detailed license information

[code]cscript slmgr.vbs /dlv all[/code]

For Office specific information you can run the below command to get the info wanted:

[code]cscript slmgr.vbs /dlv bfe7a195-4f8f-4f0b-a622-cf13c7d16864[/code]

Note I add cscript to the front of the command so that the output stays within the command window, this lets me output/scroll if there is a lot of data where as the usual vbs dialog crops the output.

Configuring KMS Clients

By default, Volume Licensing edition of Windows Vista, Windows7 , Windows Server2008, and Windows Server2008R2 are KMS clients. If the computers the organisation wants to activate using KMS are using any of these operating systems and the network allows DNS auto-discovery, no further configuration is needed.

If required you can configure the KMS client to connect to a specific KMS host, use a specific port and disable KMS auto-discovery.

When deploying KMS clients using WAIK you can use 2 different methods to prepare the client:

• SYSPREP – run Sysprep /generalize which will reset the activation timer along with removing SID and a few other settings. Read about this before actually using it.
• Software License Manager – run slmgr.vbs /rearm in an elevated command prompt to reset the grace period back to 30 days. Note you can only perform this 3 times in total.

You can also manually force activation of the client by using the GUI from Control Panel -> System or by running slmgr /ato.

If you want to convert MAK installations of Windows or Office to KMS, you need to change their product key, and then reactivate. Use the below keys to perform this:

You can convert Windows and Office from MAC to KMS using the GUI available, or you can use the following commands:

Windows
To install a KMS key, type slmgr.vbs /ipk KmsKey at a command prompt.
To active online, type slmgr.vbs /ato at a command prompt.
To activate by using the telephone, type slui.exe 4 at a command prompt.

Office
To install a KMS key, type ospp.vbs /inpkey:KmsKey at a command prompt.
To active online, type ospp.vbs /act at a command prompt.

Important Links

Here are the resources that I got most of the information I needed.

• Deploying KMS Activation
  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff793409.aspx
• How to install or Update KMS on Server 2008 for windows 7 and Server 2008 Support
  http://myitforum.com/cs2/blogs/jmarcum/archive/2009/10/29/142586.aspx
• Plan volume activation of Office 2010
  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee624358.aspx
• Deploy volume activation of Office 201
  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee624357.aspx
• Troubleshoot volume activation for Office 2010
  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee624355.aspx
• Tools to configure client computers in Office 2010
  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee624350.aspx