Comments on: MAK vs. KMS: advantages and disadvantages of activating Vista using MAKs

By: Michael Pietroforte

Michael Pietroforte — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 15:57:16 +0000

David, I have never tried it, but I would be surprised if it didnt’t work.

By: David

David — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 05:41:39 +0000

If I’m looking to deploy 2 Windows 2008 servers initally, but know forwell in the future there will be more than 5 then what do I have to do?

What I have read points in the direction of MAK, but if I install these and activate under MAK then install another two actiavting them using MAK and finally deploy my 5th then can they all start to using KMS or because the other 4 are already activated under MAK will the KMS service not work unitl 5 winodws 2008 servers are deployed at the same time?

Hope this makes sense. Basically when I add more windows 2008 servers over time and they get to 5 on the network can you change from MAK to KMS?

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 27 May 2008 08:51:10 +0000

Titus, when it comes to compatibility it doesn’t matter if you work with MAKs or KMS.

By: titus

titus — Mon, 26 May 2008 09:44:48 +0000

will i face any incompatibility issues after activating mak?

By: Michael

Michael — Sat, 16 Jun 2007 06:07:20 +0000

misph1re, if you permanently take Vista PCs off the company network, you’d better use MAKs. Actually, this is why Microsoft offers the MAK solution.

By: Lukas Beeler

Lukas Beeler — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 20:18:39 +0000

After 180 days, the system reminds you that it needs activation.

After 210 days, the system goes into RFM – Reduced Functionality Mode. You won’t be able to work on it anymore at this point.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/925582

By: misph1re

misph1re — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 17:58:38 +0000

So what happens if you have employees that build and activate machines on a domain using a KMS server, then permanantly take the system off the domain to an isolated location no longer in contact with the KMS server?

Time to dust off our linux evaluation project again I guess.

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 15 May 2007 20:21:40 +0000

Cyanna, that’s certainly an interesting argument. If you are working with KMS, deploying a new driver shouldn’t be a problem because your clients will activate again automatically. If you work with MAKs, however, you have to invest extra work to get them activated again.

By: cyanna

cyanna — Sat, 12 May 2007 11:39:12 +0000

One problem is how often will tthe PCs de-activate. Some tests we ran on a test lab comprised of 15 PCs (enterprise total 350) resulted in reactivation needed for many different scenarios: driver updates, network client product replacement, NIC replacements….
Microsoft has been complettely quiet and uncooperative about providing any means to at least beeing able to plan for this kind of event. Contacting our MS rep will be of very limited help if I get 100 machines in RFM within 3 days just because I pushed a new driver. Some of those machines might not be able to connec to the network in that time frame!
Anybody been more succesfull obtaining some info about what events or combinaion of events will trigger a reactivation?

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 20:48:39 +0000

Lukas, that is interesting because we only got 100 activations even though we have about 600 PCs. However, according to our contract we can install an unlimited number of Vista machines since we only pay per employee. One thing is for sure, though, these 100 activations would never be enough if we only use MAK activation.

By: Adminspotting.net » Links for April 05, 2007

Adminspotting.net » Links for April 05, 2007 — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 01:50:25 +0000

[...] 4sysops — MAK vs. KMS: advantages and disadvantages of activating Vista using MAKs [...]

By: Lukas Beeler

Lukas Beeler — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 20:19:11 +0000

We have a Windows Vista Business MAK Key, as a Microsoft Partner.

We have 25 Licenses for Vista Business, and got 500 Activations on that Key, at least according to VAMT.

So the chance that you will have to ring up Microsoft is pretty slim.