[2004, 20h2] Issues with Shared Computer Activation on single PC for MS 365 for Business

[kennysarmy]

Strange issue which I can't get to the bottom of.

 

Teacher alerts us when she opens WORD (and other office apps) that she gets a banner saying the app is unlicensed. We confirm issue and delete local profile, in the hope it's isolated to that one teacher.

 

Issue remains on relogon.

 

We uninstall and reinstall Office.

 

Issue remains on relogon and we see new accounts logging on have the same issue.

 

Our domain account logon - works fine!

 

Bring the PC back to our office for further investigation.

 

Take a test teacher account and replicate the issue.

 

Promote test teacher account to domain account - put in same part of AD - make account identical to domain admin account - issue remains.

 

If we sign in to office then it does clear the Unlicensed error banner - but all other PC's on the network auto sign users in and don't get this issue.

 

Teacher does not have issues on other PC's, test user does not have issues on other PC's.

 

Microsoft remote on to PC and suggest some registry changes which make no difference.

 

I know I could just re-image the PC and I'm 99.9999% sure that will fix the issue, but I'm intrigued now as to what it is on this PC that's now signing in users correctly when office apps open AND THEN WHY - one domain account is not getting the same issue.

 

 

I did try running fiddler when logged on as the elevated test account and nothing seemed to be being blocked. (I expected this as surely a filter block would affect all PC's / Users)

 

For working users on other PC's a licence folder gets created in C:\Users\\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Office\16.0

 

But on this PC that folder doesn't get created when they first open say WORD.

 

 

Also tried removing the PC from the Domain and re-adding.

 

 

 

Any thoughts gratefully received.

[mdrabble]

Interesting as I’ve seen some of these of late.

 

Ended up going to the office 365 portal and removing the office activations for the user and that seems to resolve the issue (or they not continued to tell me still not working)

 

Once removed if the close and open any office 365 app, all then ok (when I’ve tested as the use via impero)

Edited September 28, 2021 by mdrabble

[kennysarmy]

Interesting as I’ve seen some of these of late.

 

Ended up going to the office 365 portal and removing the office activations for the user and that seems to resolve the issue (or they not continued to tell me still not working)

 

Once removed if the close and open any office 365 app, all then ok (when I’ve tested as the use via impero)

 

Thanks for your reply.

 

Sadly I think this is a PC issue rather than user, as I can logon test users elsewhere fine, it's just this one PC that's got messed up.

 

I know I will end up re-imagining it but wanted to try and understand the process of why it was broken

 

Microsoft have looked at it and basically said as long as the users can sign in manually that's fine.

Even though they are auto-signed in on all 800+ PC's on the domain, which points to something not right with this one.

[Boredguy]

We've had this a few times since August, but we found the issue on the station appeared to be the windows firewall got corrupted in the August update.

 

If you are unable to ping the workstation (and others happily respond), try downloading the Windows Firewall Troubleshooter from the MS website for it to reset it.

It's easier than a rebuild

[DaveTheTech]

ARe you using a shared device licence?

I get this every now and then, for what every reason our TS doesn't licence Office as it should.

Try running:

cscript "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office16\OSPP.VBS" /dstatus

cscript "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office16\OSPP.VBS" /act

 

Its likely that only the second is needed, but this sorts out the occasional problem I have here

[kennysarmy]

We've had this a few times since August, but we found the issue on the station appeared to be the windows firewall got corrupted in the August update.

 

If you are unable to ping the workstation (and others happily respond), try downloading the Windows Firewall Troubleshooter from the MS website for it to reset it.

It's easier than a rebuild

 

Local firewall is turned off - so not applicable in this case but thanks for suggestion.

[kennysarmy]

ARe you using a shared device licence?

I get this every now and then, for what every reason our TS doesn't licence Office as it should.

Try running:

cscript "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office16\OSPP.VBS" /dstatus

cscript "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office16\OSPP.VBS" /act

 

Its likely that only the second is needed, but this sorts out the occasional problem I have here

 

Yes, shared device licence for 365.

 

 

When it breaks...

 

[ozydave]

Did you every get a reliable fix for this?

[ITGURU]

I gave up with all this when realised we'd have issues with exam accounts using office and having no internet access, so sticking with LTSC versions for now.