Video Walkthrough for Office 2010 KMS Activation:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/ff716617.aspx?ITPID=flpbook

Volume Activation Quick Start Guide Download:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=311e7e71-ea1d-4ddd-bb36-b68349dd9539&displaylang=en

TechNet Article:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee624359.aspx

Planned KMS Activation of Office 2010

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff603508.aspx

Office Volume Activation Resource Center

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/office/ee691939.aspx

Microsoft Office 2010 activation method is almost similar with Windows 7 activation. You have to configure Key Management Service (KMS) host to activate Office 2010 clients. Note down the following MS Office 20101 activation tricks.

1. Key Management Service (KMS) hosts configured to activate MS Office should be installed on operating systems such as Windows Server 2003, volume editions of Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2

2. If you want KMS host to activate multiple Microsoft products (e.g. Office 2010 and Windows 7), you will need to install the Windows KMS host key with Office KMS host key and activate both of them

3. Microsoft Office KMS clients are only activated when five or more than five computers with MS Office installed attempt to get activated using the KMS host. In case of operating systems (e.g. Windows Vista and Windows 7), activation starts after 25 or more than 25 computers with Windows client request for activation.

Differences between Windows and Office activation

Differences between Windows activation and Office activation with regard to both KMS and MAK are as follows:

• The activation threshold for the KMS host is five client computers. Five physical or virtual computers that have Office installed must request activation before KMS clients become activated.
• Only one KMS host key must be installed and activated on the Office KMS host. This KMS host can then activate all Office 2010 products with the KMS client key installed.
• When using slmgr.vbs commands on the KMS host, you must enter the Office 2010 activation ID (bfe7a195-4f8f-4f0b-a622-cf13c7d16864). For more information about the slmgr.vbs script, see Deploy volume activation of Office 2010.
• To ensure that the Office 2010 KMS host key is recognized, you must run KeyManagementServiceHost.exe to install the Office license files.
• Each Office suite or product has its own MAK key. In addition, here are separate MAK keys for Microsoft Project 2010 and Microsoft Visio. For example, with a single MAK key you can activate all applications in the Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 suite, but you must enter separate MAK keys for Project 2010, Visio, or any of the Office Professional Plus 2010 suite products, such as Microsoft Word 2010 or Microsoft Excel 2010.

Co-hosting an Office KMS host with a Windows KMS host

If currently you have a Windows KMS host running on an operating system that supports an Office KMS host, we recommend that you use the same computer for your Office KMS host. You still must perform the following steps to install and activate an Office 2010 KMS host key. For more information, see Plan volume activation of Office 2010.

To activate an Office KMS host on Windows Server 2003

1. If you do not have Key Management Service (KMS) 1.2 installed on Windows Server 2003, follow the instructions specified in Microsoft Knowledge Base article 968915: An update is available that installs Key Management Service (KMS) 1.2 for Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 (SP2) and for later versions of Windows Server 2003 (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=183046).
2. Download and run KeyManagementServiceHost.exe at Microsoft Office 2010 KMS Host License Pack (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=169244) Web site.
3. When prompted, enter your KMS host key.
4. When prompted, continue the activation process. If your KMS host does not have an Internet connection, see To activate a KMS host by telephone in Deploy volume activation of Office 2010 for instructions about how to activate the KMS host by telephone.
5. If you have a firewall enabled, open TCP port 1688. This is the default port number.

To activate an Office KMS host on Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2

1. Download and run KeyManagementServiceHost.exe at Microsoft Office 2010 KMS Host License Pack (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=169244) Web site.
2. When prompted, enter your KMS host key.
3. When prompted, continue the activation process. If your KMS host does not have an Internet connection, see To activate a KMS host by telephone in Deploy volume activation of Office 2010 for instructions about how to activate the KMS host by telephone.
4. If you have a firewall enabled, perform the following steps to enable KMS through the firewall:
   1. In Control Panel, open Windows Firewall.
   2. Click Allow a program or feature through Windows Firewall.
   3. Click Change Settings.
   4. Select the Key Management Service check box, and then click OK.

Configure DNS

KMS hosts automatically publish their existence by creating service (SRV) resource records (RRs) on the DNS server. If there is only one KMS host and dynamic update, no action is required for the KMS host to create the SRV RR that publishes the KMS service location.

If there is more than one KMS host, only the first KMS host can create an SRV RR. Subsequent KMS hosts cannot change or update SRV RRs unless the default permissions on the DNS server are changed.

Changing the default permissions on the DNS server requires administrative rights in the domain, and the KMS hosts must all belong to the same Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) domain. Create a global security group in AD DS for your KMS hosts. Add each KMS host to the new security group, and set the permissions on the DNS server to allow updates by members of the newly created security group.

For more information about how to configure DNS for the KMS host, see “Understanding KMS” in Customer Hosted Volume Activation Guide(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=187539).

Verify successful activation of the Office KMS host

To verify that the Office 2010 KMS host key is successfully installed and activated, use the slmgr.vbs script. Open an elevated command prompt on the KMS host, type the following command, and then press ENTER:

cscript slmgr.vbs /dlv all

To view information only for Office 2010, specify the Activation ID after the /dlv parameter:

cscript slmgr.vbs /dlv bfe7a195-4f8f-4f0b-a622-cf13c7d16864

The output should resemble the following:

If the output shows “License Status: Licensed,” the Office 2010 KMS host key is successfully installed and activated.

Once KMS clients send requests for activation, the current count is incremented. The current count must be 5 or greater before KMS clients activate. The maximum current count will be twice the activation threshold, or 10. Administrators can also check the KMS log that is in the Applications and Services Logs folder for event ID 12290, the ID for KMS-related activity. The KMS log records activation requests from KMS clients. Each event displays the name of the computer and the time stamp of each activation request.

To diagnose KMS activation errors

1. If the computer has the KMS client key installed, check the licensing status. To do this, type the following command, and then press ENTER: cscript ospp.vbs /dstatusall
2. To check the KMS activation history, type the following command, and then press ENTER:cscript ospp.vbs /dhistorykms
3. To trigger activation, type the following command, and then press ENTER:cscript ospp.vbs /act
4. Check the error message for error code 0xC004F042. If you see an error code in the notification dialog boxes shown to the users, you can also use that code to check the error message. To do this, type the following command, and then press ENTER: cscript ospp.vbs /ddescr:0xC004F042

To set test KMS host name, and then set to auto-discovery

1. If you are testing a KMS host named kmstest.contoso.com, and you want to specify it in the KMS client, type the following command, and then press ENTER:cscript ospp.vbs /sethst:kmstest.contoso.com Note: If you change the default port on the KMS host, you must run ospp.vbs with the /setprt parameter.
2. To trigger activation, type the following command, and then press ENTER:cscript ospp.vbs /act
3. To check the KMS activation history to see whether the host was successfully contacted, type the following command, and then press ENTER:cscript ospp.vbs /dhistorykms
4. Now you want this KMS client to use Domain Name System (DNS) for auto-discovery of the production KMS host. To remove the KMS host name, type the following command, and then press ENTER:cscript ospp.vbs /remhst

Generally, you do not have to configure Office KMS clients if the Office KMS host was correctly set up and configured. The KMS client automatically searches for the KMS host by using DNS and attempts activation. The KMS service uses service (SRV) resource records (RR) in DNS to store and communicate the locations of KMS hosts.

By default, KMS hosts automatically publish the information that KMS clients need to find and connect to them by using DNS dynamic update protocol. By default, KMS clients query the DNS server for KMS service information.

You can manually configure KMS hosts and clients, depending on the network configuration and security requirements.

For example, if the network environment does not use SRV records, you can manually configure a KMS client to use a specific KMS host. For more information about how to configure the KMS client, see The ospp.vbs script earlier in this article and Prepare and configure the Office 2010 client in Deploy volume activation of Office 2010.

For more information about how to configure the KMS host, see Prepare and configure the KMS host in Deploy volume activation of Office 2010.