KMS Activation

General

Microsoft products have to be activated periodically at our TU internal KMS server. To perform an activation at the KMS server, a connection to the TUnet must be given and the access to the activation server must be enabled. This is done in the activation scripts in a separate point by means of TUaccount. The activation is valid for about 10 minutes.

If there are problems with the activation, please check if you are using the latest activation script. For Windows as well as for Office products the activation scripts are part of the TUtoolbox. Since the new activation scripts are much easier to use and also offer a much improved log function, only the new activation scripts can be supported.

Therefore, if there are problems with a KMS activation, please install the latest script first (for ALL Windows operating systems with the TUtoolbox) and try the activation again. If the problem persists, please use the integrated support function to create a ticket.

In general, please note that an (institute) firewall may prevent activation. A connection to kms.tuwien.ac.at:1700 must ALWAYS be possible, a connection to kms.tuwien.ac.at:1688 after activation is necessary. Also note that your license order must first be released before you can perform an activation. You can test the connection to the KMS server with the tool Portchecker, which is also included in the TUtoolbox.

Impact

Furthermore, please note that the activation script also changes some security-related settings. These are among others:

• Support information
• Time server
• TU WSUS as update source
• Update Settings
• Security settings for TU server

For servers, users are prompted before rebooting for updates, and for desktops, reboots are forced daily starting at 5 am.

Special use of the activation script

Besides mainstream use, there are also some special cases where the default behavior of the activation script needs to be customized. The following commandline arguments are available for this purpose:

-SkipReg

No registry values are changed

-nointernetcheck

There is no check for an active Internet connection

-noupdates

Updates are suppressed by registry. This also affects the notification about updates.

-deinstall

The set registry entries are deleted

-timeout=xxxx

The internal timeout is set to the value in ms (e.g. for slow connections).

All other switches are for internal use only and should not be used.

Version history of the activation script

2.0.5.3

• Security patch for 'New Outlook App' has been integrated.

2.0.5.2

• Workaround for Windows ARM activations on MacOS where no client type can be determined.

2.0.5.1

• Additional tool tips before starting the activations.
• Links in the texts of the welcome page open a browser.

2.0.5.0

• Display of a help button
• Display of the used commandline switches on the start page
• New possibility to suppress updates via registry
• No forced reboot for servers
• Adjustments of the support information