OVS and VLSC

[Sheridan]

Quick question for those of you using OVS or EES - we used to use Select agreements and managed our keys/downloads etc from the VLSC. Now we have subscribed to a OVS agreement (hurray!) which is tied to the same email/account as our old VLSC account.

 

Question is, where do we find the new license keys for office/windows etc are the VLSC (under the agreements section/our new OVS agreement/Product Keys) says "No Volume License keys were found. Your agreement entitlements may not include Volume License keys. Please contact your partner or reseller for more information"

 

We can't use our previous Select keys as this have activation limits on them - has anyone else moved from Select to OVS and found the same thing?

[localzuk]

They should appear in the same place. Has your order been added to the site yet? Or just the agreement?

[andybarker27]

it can take a few days for the keys to appear. but they are in the same place as all the others

[Sheridan]

It might just be a timing thing then - the list of OVS products are shown in Offerings, but the Orders shows Zero against the OVS agreement. May I should wait a couple more days to see if they appear!

 

Just impatient to get cracking I suppose!

[Sheridan]

They have appeared now! It must have just been a delay - only problem is all my MAK's are showing with an activation limit of 250 - which defeats the purpose of an OVS surely? I would have thought these were unlimited for our site.

[Willott]

You should have KMS available - the preferred method from MS is KMS activation. I believe (read it somewhere recently - cannot remember source) that you can contact Microsoft to request an increase in MAK count, at least when you get close to the top of your count.

[andybarker27]

once you reach near 250 you can send an email to [email protected] with your agreement number and an explanation of why you require more.

personally id use KMS much easier to manage. its dead simple toset up

[timbo343]

I use KMS for domain machines but then for laptops which teachers have i use MAK. Teacher laptops dont see the domain or the network that often once teachers have signed the laptop uaage policy . Edited October 1, 2013 by timbo343

[localzuk]

I use KMS for domain machines but then for laptops which teachers have i use MAK. Teacher laptops dont see the domain or the network that often once teachers have signed the laptop uaage policy .

 

All the more reason to use KMS with them! Force them to bring them in to school.

[sparkeh]

All the more reason to use KMS with them! Force them to bring them in to school.

 

Yeah that's what we do, once every... 180 days is it?... Isn't so tough on 'em ;-)

[Sheridan]

I prefer the idea of KMS for fixed PCs and MAK for laptops.

 

Only problem is my OVS subscription doesn't offer me any KMS keys to setup my KMS server on the VLSC!

Edited October 2, 2013 by Sheridan

[Sheridan]

Not happy with this OVS so far - I can't use KMS server as the OVS doesn't cover Server licences, which I understood but thought could still setup a KMS host to activate our clients

 

And the MAK activation is stuck at 250 - which can be raised to 500, but that doesn't match up with the concept of licensing FTE staff and not devices.

 

Why I can't setup a KMS host under OVS is beyond me - surely thats the whole point of volume licensing? All my server licenses were bought under Select licenses.

[localzuk]

I have server licenses and KMS under OVS. You're being told nonsense there I think! If they need you to have a server license in order to do it, I'd suggest biting the bullet and paying the £30 a year for a server license.

[Sheridan]

To set up a KMS hosts I need a KMS key to set this us - MS don't provide this through OVS so thats a bit misleading. I understand my servers aren't licenses but the whole point of KMS is to activate volume clients!

 

And the MAK activation limit is pretty low - if you setup OVS for 200 FTE staff you're going to have a lot more devices than 250 (or even 500 if you increase it)

[timbo343]

@Sheridan You should have had an agreement summary from MS or your supplier stating what you have bought. Have you made sure that you have got server licenses on this? You can use a Wndows 7 or Server 2008 R2 KMS key to activate your win 7 or 2008 R2 licenses.

 

You should have KMS and MAK licenses on your account in MS. Once logged in go to Licenses >> Relationship Summary >> Find and click on your agreement summary >> then click on product keys. They should be there.

Edited October 2, 2013 by timbo343

[StevieM]

@Sheridan In your product list, do you not have the Key Management Service Host available to download? That's all I needed and I've just managed to deploy and authenticate Office 2013 on every computer in my school.

 

Copied from my VLSC product list:

Edited October 2, 2013 by StevieM

[localzuk]

To set up a KMS hosts I need a KMS key to set this us - MS don't provide this through OVS so thats a bit misleading. I understand my servers aren't licenses but the whole point of KMS is to activate volume clients!

 

And the MAK activation limit is pretty low - if you setup OVS for 200 FTE staff you're going to have a lot more devices than 250 (or even 500 if you increase it)

 

As I said, we have OVS here and we get our KMS key through it. So, it isn't the OVS that means you don't have the right key.

[Sheridan]

I've managed to setup the Office (2010 in our case) KMS host, but cannot do this for Windows 7 clients. Our servers are all licensed under Select and the clients under the OVS (Education park with Office/OS and CALs)

 

I rang MS and they simply say I'm not entitled to a KMS host key under this OVS as the servers aren'y included. I used the KMS host key from one of my Select agreements but this doesn't seem to have added any client OS's to the KMS host!

[StevieM]

Our servers are all licensed under Select and the clients under the OVS

 

Same here. We purchased our server licences and CALs when we upgraded our network. All we have under EES is Office and Windows. When I click on the Key dropdown in the product list, it shows both KMS and MAK. Strange that yours doesn't do the same. If I were you, I would take it up with your reseller. I'm sure there is a cooling off period if your not satisfied with the system.

[Sheridan]

Same here. We purchased our server licences and CALs when we upgraded our network. All we have under EES is Office and Windows. When I click on the Key dropdown in the product list, it shows both KMS and MAK. Strange that yours doesn't do the same. If I were you, I would take it up with your reseller. I'm sure there is a cooling off period if your not satisfied with the system.

 

I wonder if it has changed since you took out your EES?

 

This is more complicated than it needs to be - all we want to do is activate Windows 7/8 clients and Office 2010! I thought the KMS server would do that but so far I've only got the Office side working.

[StevieM]

I wonder if it has changed since you took out your EES?

 

I doubt it. We've only just taken it out at the start of this academic year, i.e. a month ago. Saying that, I've not tried deploying OS yet - but I least I can access my KMS key

 

Hope you get it sorted without too much (more) trouble.

[Sheridan]

I'm not sure whether I'm just getting this wrong. I activated our KMS host using the KMS key from a Seelct agreement. This was successful and so was the office 2010 KMS installation.

 

But when I list all of the products (slmgr.vbs /DLV /ALL) it doesn't show any Windows OS keys.

 

However when I changed a Windows 7 client to the new OVS KMS key and activated it (slmgr.vbs /ato) it activated ok - and with it being a KMS key that must have gone through our KMS server?

[DrPerceptron]

I don't think it shows any keys regardless (ours doesn't, other than the partial KMS server key). You can use VAMT to check and troubleshoot the status of client machines though - it's an excellent tool (I use VAMT2 because its lower maintenance)

[Sheridan]

I think I'll have to give up on this and revert back to MAK

 

My understanding of this KMS was that you installed a KMS server, activated it with a KMS host key and then added your KMS client keys to it (office, windows etc).

 

My KMS host has activated using the Select KMS host key , and seems to have accepted the office 2010 kms keys - but will not accept the Windows 7 one (Error: 0xC004F015)

 

TBH I wish I'd stuck with select and oem now.

[DrPerceptron]

I think I'll have to give up on this and revert back to MAK

 

My understanding of this KMS was that you installed a KMS server, activated it with a KMS host key and then added your KMS client keys to it (office, windows etc).

 

My KMS host has activated using the Select KMS host key , and seems to have accepted the office 2010 kms keys - but will not accept the Windows 7 one (Error: 0xC004F015)

 

TBH I wish I'd stuck with select and oem now.

 

Not sure. We licensed our DC with a KMS host key and installed the Office 2010 key and patch and that's it.

 

MDT uses a KMS option, as does office, anything that throws a wobbly about invalid product keys, we throw a KMS Client key at it (KMS Client Setup Keys), activate it and it's usually happily licensed.