Tip of the Day: Automatic Virtual Machine Activation (AVMA)

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Today’s Tip…

A new feature of Windows Server 2012 R2 is Automatic Virtual Machine Activation (AVMA).  This feature is primarily designed for Web Hosters but is useful for your own internal Hyper-V server you use for testing and repro work.

What this means is if you setup a Windows Server 2012 R2 Hyper-V host, any Windows Server 2012 R2 virtual machines you create are automatically activated provided the host is activated.  Quick steps to setup

  1. Install Windows Server 2012 R2
  2. Install Hyper-V Role
  3. Make sure your host system is activated.  If on corpnet you will activate via KMS/ADBA
  4. Create your Windows Server 2012 R2 virtual machine and install Windows Server 2012 R2
  5. Change the default GVLK(KMS client key)to one of the following to convert it to AVMA activation:
    1. Datacenter:  Y4TGP-NPTV9-HTC2H-7MGQ3-DV4TW
    2. Standard:  DBGBW-NPF86-BJVTX-K3WKJ-MTB6V
    3. Essentials:  K2XGM-NMBT3-2R6Q8-WF2FK-P36R2

Additional information:  https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn303421.aspx