Linked Clones (Composer) and Office 2010 activation

[ribanez]

Hi all,

We have a deployment with Linked Clone desktops in our office with View 4.5. We need to install an Office 2010 in each desktop, and we have a MAK key for the Office, so we installed and activated the Office in the parent VM. The problem is that every time we refresh or recompose desktops, the Office claims for activation in each user desktop.

Is there any way to activate the Office only a first time in the parent VM, and get all other desktops with Office activated?

Thanks in advance.

[npeter]

Is it happening with sysprep and quickprep customization for pool creation?

[jaksun]

Win7 or XP?

I have got a bunch of Win7 desktops and i provision all of them using linked clones and quickprep. The office 2010 is activated and registred on the parent machine.

Works like a charm. So the questions are: Are you using Win7? And if that's the case, are you quickpreping the machines or are you using sysprep?

[Camek]

We use Office 2010 with Linked Clone desktops and the only way to make this work well is with a KMS server.  On our standard desktop with Office 2010 you have to rearm Office 2010 before you use tools like Ghost but with Linked Clones we have not needed to use that process.

[ribanez]

Hi all,

Thanks for the responses. We installed a KMS server and the first Office detected the KMS server perfectly.

Now, the problem is that all the desktops have the same "KMS client machine ID", and the KMS server only shows 1 in the license activation count. This is suppossed to be solved syspreping the desktops with a /generalize argument*.

So, how can we sysprep desktops using composer? Under "Guest customization" tab in the composer desktop pool I don't see any of my customization specifications created.

My VCenter has the appropriate XP sysprep files, and it has one customization specification created, that I tested in another template and works well.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

*As a Microsoft Engineer said in:  http://blogs.technet.com/b/askcore/archive/2009/10/16/kms-host-client-count-not-increasing-due-to-du...

[mittim12]

Sysprep is available as an option for composer pools created under View 4.5.   It's only available at pool creation so you would need to createa  new pool. 

[ribanez]

That's correct. Sysprep can be used with Linked Clones... but you need a vCenter v4.1 or later to use sysprep+composer if you are using View 4.5, and I have a vCenter 4.0... Damn.. I will need to upgrade it.

In conclussion:

To deploy an environment with linked clones (or an automated pool with few desktops) and Office 2010, Windows 7, or another Windows product that requires activation, the best solution is to install a KMS server in your environment, and then sysprep the desktops to generate a new "KMS client machine ID" for each desktop.

Thanks all for your help

[Camek]

We use quick prep and you don't need to use the full sysprep to make this work.  You need to get 5 machines setup with KMS keys with office 2010 for it to start working corectly.  We just took 5 "phycial" deskops installed Office 2010 made sure they activiated with the KMS, this will get the KMS passing out keys and you can then use View with quick prep and will not have any issues with your KMS.

BTW -  This is the same thing you must do to get Windows 2008 / 2008 R2 working with a KMS server when setting up servers in vSphere.