Activating Trial OS Versions
I sometimes contemplate writing on topics that may have obvious conclusions for many IT-Pros. Often I see questions on certain topics posted all over the place with not a whole lot in the way of clear answers. Today's post will be one of these.
Here is the scenario:
- you are running a Server 2012 Standard or Datacenter host
- you have stood up VMs using Microsoft Trial Versions
- your OS has expired or is about to expire (preventing work from being done)
- you read some posts, telling you to execute the following at the command line (to activate the 2012 Standard):
slmgr /ipk DBGBW-NPF86-BJVTX-K3WKJ-MTB6V
But, after hitting the enter key you get:
Here is the Solution:
- verify the version of the OS you are running by executing the following at a command prompt:
DISM /online /Get-CurrentEdition
- if you are running a trial version of Server 2012 Standard, you will get a response similar to this:
- obtain the product key (this is not a license) for the version that you would like to activate
- execute the following at the command prompt:
DISM.exe /online /Set-Edition:ServerStandard /ProductKey:DBGBW-NPF86-BJVTX-K3WKJ-MTB6V /AcceptEula
- if everything works out, you will get a response similar to this:
Hopefully that helps some of you out there in IT-land!