Windows 7 duplicate cmid KMS

[Migration User]

I am attempting to clone Windows 7 Professional and then activate using a KMS server. Using GSS 2.5.1. The imaging works perfectly but when I deploy an image to identical workstations all those workstations report to the KMS server with the same Client Machine ID (CMID). Therefore they won't activate because they're all identical.

Apoparently sysprep /generalize is meant to fix this issue by removing machine specific information but its not working for me. I setup the Windows 7 workstation with all the apps, apply a Windows 7 sysprep template to the Image Create task (making sure that the 'Run Microsoft sysprep...' and the 'Rund sysprep with /generalize switch are both ticked.

I would really appreciate some assistance as to how get this to work properly as currently I have 250 Windows 7 workstation deployed but none of them will activate due to this duplicate CMID problem.

Thanks,

Mark

[Migration User]

We are having the same issue here. I think maybe we need to capture image using sysprep

[Migration User]

Ran into the same problem ghosting win 7 clients. I've never bothered using sysprep previously, and haven't had any problem as we have been running win xp. But KMS is a different beast, so the CMID problem reared it's head. I really didn't want to have to re-image my machines again, and looked for a way around it.

The easiest and quickest way I found is to simply run "slmgr -rearm" at the machines, and then reboot. I used the sysinternals psexec to do it remotely. It should also have worked with "slmgr machinename -rearm" but for some reason it didn't work for me.

After running this and the machines rebooted, they had had no problem activate against the KMS.  Ofcourse, you may have other need to run sysprep, but for me it doesn't seem to cause any other issues. YMMW and all that :)

 

/Petter

[Migration User]

I´ve had the same problem for a while now, it seems the /generalize is not working, in conjuction with SkipRearm flag in sysprep unattented file.

The bottom line is, you gotta reset the activation timer and set an UNIQUE CMID, for that:

To reset the activation timer and to set a unique CMID, the Rearm process must run on the destination computer. This process is used to reset the activation state. In Windows, the Rearm process can be run by using one of the following two methods:  

• Run Sysprep together with the /generalize option on the computer that is used to build the Custom Windows image.
• Force the Rearm process to occur by running the Slmgr.vbs script in an elevated Command Prompt window. For example, type:
  cscript c:\windows\system32\slmgr.vbs –rearm

 

 

The article was editted in november 18 2010 by Microsoft: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929829

 

If that solves, please mark as Solution :)