Microsoft Office activations

pvr

pvr

Dutch
 Ruler of the South East UK
I bought a whole load of licenses for Microsoft Office 2007 - elligible for free upgrade to 2010. Great, no problems there.

However - the rules are that they all have to be activated before 30th September, and I am not ready to install them yet and activate so want to use a single PC to activate each license in turn (after which I can order the FOC Office 2010 suite which is what I am after).

Anyone know a quick way of entering a new product key, and activate it without uninstalling - installing the entire product suite each time?

It was a good deal - honestly, but I don't want to sit here all evening doing these installations ... :headbang:
 
The product key just goes online to authenticate, there is an option after the install to call the activation centre instead, they may be able to do the lot in one go (assume they must have some bulk facility for companies that cannot access the web, as unlikely as that is):
http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/existing-customers/activation-centers.aspx

Last ditch... if you do need to do each one in turn, do you have any VM technology for work? Create a template including OS and Office set it up fully but without entering the Office product key, it will still be a pain but at least you won't need to do a full uninstall and install each time.
 
Yes, I do have a VM machine. However, the key needs to be entered right at the beginning before the actual installation:(

The activation centre needs your key though (from help / about - well, in 2007 it is in some weird place that I had to look up on the web :) ).

Will have a play with trying to wreck an installation to see if I can enter the product key again without reinstalling it.
 
Of course. You could fire up multiple VMs from the one template and let the installs run simultaneously then destroy the lot.

Otherwise use a custom install and just install the smallest component - I'd guess OneNote - it will still require the key activating.

Actually interested to see if there is a solution for this one.
 
pvr said:
Yes, I do have a VM machine. However, the key needs to be entered right at the beginning before the actual installation:(

The activation centre needs your key though (from help / about - well, in 2007 it is in some weird place that I had to look up on the web :) ).

Will have a play with trying to wreck an installation to see if I can enter the product key again without reinstalling it.
Click to expand...

Going back to the original VM theory - will work if you have a PC that's Office 2007 ready ie with the eval installed. Clone it as a VM. Create that as the template. Fire up a new VM from the template, activate the Office eval. Delete the VM. Repeat.
 
Ok, can do the following in VM:

- Install Office, but do NOT enter the key so you get the 25 "free" launches
- Copy the VM image, and launch it
- activate the key

Repeat 40 times :cry:
 
Package it, then run the single MSI automated installer on each machine - I guess you dont have enought machines to justify Altiris or SCCM but there are some free packaging tools out there such as rpm

Or for a more longterm solution go for Ghost Solution Suite so that OS and application management can be administrated in a more automated one click fashion
 
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