What you are looking for may differ, depending on the issue to be solved. The most important fields for troubleshooting are the following. The following screenshot shows the results of this command on one of our KMS hosts within Microsoft. To see verbose output from the Software Licensing service, open an elevated Command Prompt window and enter slmgr.vbs /dlv at the command prompt. Slmgr.vbs and the Software Licensing service Second, check the Event Viewer for events that are related to licensing or activation. First, check the status of the host software license service. There are two areas to examine on the KMS host. After activating, the KMS clients try to renew their activation every seven days.įrom a troubleshooting perspective, you may have to look at both sides (host and client) to determine what is going on. During the 30-day out-of-the-box grace period, they will try to activate every two hours.

Then the clients automatically try to discover and use this service to activate themselves. The KMS clients use DNS SRV records (_vlmcs._tcp) to identify the KMS host. The presence of the GVLK is what makes a system a KMS client. The KMS clients are supplied with a pre-installed key, called the Generic Volume License Key (GVLK) or KMS Client Setup Key. KMS clients can be running any edition of Windows that uses volume activation.

The KMS client is the Windows operating system that is deployed in the environment and has to activate.

To configure a KMS host, you have to install a KMS key from the Volume License Service Center (VLSC) and then activate the service.

The KMS host runs the activation service and enables activation in the environment.

There are two roles: the KMS host and the KMS client. KMS is also a renewal model, in which the clients try to reactivate on a regular interval.

Instead of handing out IP addresses to clients on their request, KMS enables product activation.

Let’s start with a quick refresher on KMS activation. For more information about event log entries and the Slmgr.vbs script, see Volume Activation Technical Reference. But what happens if that process doesn’t work? What do you do next? This article walks you through the resources that you require in order to troubleshoot the issue. It is a simple process to set up the KMS host, after which the KMS clients discover the host and try to activate on their own. Guidelines for troubleshooting the Key Management Service (KMS)Īs part of their deployment process, many enterprise customers set up the Key Management Service (KMS) to enable activation of Windows in their environment.

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