5000 Devices to Update by July 29th!

[thatley]

Hi all,

 

We are an LA that supports approx. 70 schools and are totally Windows 7, Server 2008 R2.

 

Obviously like many of you, we will want to take advantage of having Windows 10 as a 'free' upgrade for our clients. The majority of our schools are on the Microsoft VLSC Licensing Scheme, however this doesn't get around having to register each device to get the upgrade to Windows 10 and there are around 5000 devices around the schools!

 

We were not planning on upgrading until we have a fully working system in place (new policies, deployment, automation etc etc) and we are waiting for Server 2016 to compliment Windows 10 but this isn't out until around Q3 this year.

 

Any suggestions as it will be impossible to manually go round and register all of these devices before July 29th! ??

 

What are any of you guys doing about this?

 

Many thanks in advance,

 

 

T. Hatley.

[localzuk]

I'm a little confused by your comment "The majority of our schools are on the Microsoft VLSC Licensing Scheme, however this doesn't get around having to register each device to get the upgrade to Windows 10"?

 

If the schools are licensed via some form of VL scheme that includes Software Assurance (eg. OVS-ES/EES or School Agreement), then the clients are already licensed to use Windows 10 - there's no extra registration needed.

 

It'd only be machines that use Select/Open agreements, without SA, or retail/OEM licenses that would need to go through that registration process.

[pantscat]

If they're volume licence customers, then have they got Software Assurance?

 

It'll be the customers without volume licences that'll be tricky... my understanding is that you'd need to upgrade their PCs to Windows 10, use a key finder to make a note of the Windows 10 key, then re-image back to Win7 until you're ready to upgrade again. Nice, huh?

[sted]

Hi all,

 

We are an LA that supports approx. 70 schools and are totally Windows 7, Server 2008 R2.

 

Obviously like many of you, we will want to take advantage of having Windows 10 as a 'free' upgrade for our clients. The majority of our schools are on the Microsoft VLSC Licensing Scheme, however this doesn't get around having to register each device to get the upgrade to Windows 10 and there are around 5000 devices around the schools!

 

We were not planning on upgrading until we have a fully working system in place (new policies, deployment, automation etc etc) and we are waiting for Server 2016 to compliment Windows 10 but this isn't out until around Q3 this year.

 

Any suggestions as it will be impossible to manually go round and register all of these devices before July 29th! ??

 

What are any of you guys doing about this?

 

Many thanks in advance,

 

 

T. Hatley.

 

if you have volume licensing then you don't need to as long as it has a qualifying license on it you can just use your vlk/mak key from vlsc

[thatley]

Thanks for all your quick replies.

 

To clarify, our schools register on the VLSC so they have access to the Microsoft Portal for all the activation keys/software etc (this is a trust agreement with MS not a Volume License agreement). Over the last few years the schools go to CAPITA/Ramesys and have ordered Windows 7/8.1 licenses, so they're not covered for Windows 10.

 

The reason they signed up to the VLSC is so that each school had one Keycode for Windows 7, which we automatically deployed and activated with WDS.

[pantscat]

Do a google search for genuineticket.xml - this might be a solution...

[thatley]

Thanks Pantscat, but unfortunately this doesn't get around having to actually install Windows 10 on every device before 29th July and register to get the free license.

 

We're not planning to install Windows 10 until either the latter half of this year or Q1 2017. I just wanted to find a way of getting the free licenses without having to install as timescales/volume of work is not possible.

[FN-GM]

Thanks Pantscat, but unfortunately this doesn't get around having to actually install Windows 10 on every device before 29th July and register to get the free license.

 

We're not planning to install Windows 10 until either the latter half of this year or Q1 2017. I just wanted to find a way of getting the free licenses without having to install as timescales/volume of work is not possible.

 

If they have volume licence agreements you don't have to register for the free licence.

[thatley]

hi FN-GM,

 

As I mentioned before, it's not a Volume License Agreement they're on - the schools purchased either Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 licenses directly from Ramesys/CAPITA, they just signed up to the VLSC to get a single key code and access to the software downloads.

[FN-GM]

hi FN-GM,

 

As I mentioned before, it's not a Volume License Agreement they're on - the schools purchased either Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 licenses directly from Ramesys/CAPITA, they just signed up to the VLSC to get a single key code and access to the software downloads.

 

If a volume licence agreement has been purchased without this is a consequence of the LA / their own actions.

 

The upgrade program isn't designed to be used on such a scale.

[Michael]

I agree with the above, the logistics involved of manually upgrading/activating each of your 5000 devices in turn is just completely unrealistic. Every device would use a unique activation key.

 

The way forward is for all schools concerned to sign up to a VLSC agreement, either as a group or individually, then all devices can be activated using the SAME activation key and likewise the same applies to Microsoft Office. You can also re-image all devices as new, rather than upgrade each device which is messy and not generally recommended in a school or business scenario.

 

The free upgrade is more applicable to home users and/or small business, not schools/businesses of a considerable size (20 or more devices).

 

With regards to managing Windows 10 without Server 2016, this is achieved by installing RSAT on a specific Windows 10 device and managing GPOs this way. At a later date, you can then upgrade existing 2008 R2 servers to 2016.