question about increasing MS volume licensing
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Say I purchase 20 Windows 10 Pro Open Business Licenses from a VAR. I then get an MS license agreement added in my MSVLC and I am able to view the MAK licenses and download the software, etc.
Now, say I want to purchase 5 more Windows 10 Pro Open Business Licenses and I go through the same VAR again. Is it typical to receive a new MS license agreement along with new MAK license keys? Or should they just be increasing the number of existing Windows 10 MAKs?
I ask this because I am in that situation where I would like to simply bump up the number of Windows 10 licenses for the sake of having only the one Windows 10 MAK.
Maybe I am just being anal, but if I have 25 computers that I'm imaging with the same single key, yet in reality I am using a key meant for 20 systems across 25, and not actually using the 5 new additional keys.... ah you all get what I'm saying...
What is the "right way" to handle this?
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@dave247 said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
Maybe I am just being anal, but if I have 25 computers that I'm imaging with the same single key, yet in reality I am using a key meant for 20 systems across 25, and not actually using the 5 new additional keys.... ah you all get what I'm saying...
It's my understanding that you can use whatever keys you want, so long as you own enough licenses to cover what you have installed. This was the case for us when we were audited a couple years ago anyway.
When you get a key from MS VLSC it doesn't ask which agreement you want the key applied to, it just gives you your key and tells you how many times you've activated with that key. For example, we only have 2 SA licenses, but our windows 10 key shows like 7/50 activations...
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@bnrstnr said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
@dave247 said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
Maybe I am just being anal, but if I have 25 computers that I'm imaging with the same single key, yet in reality I am using a key meant for 20 systems across 25, and not actually using the 5 new additional keys.... ah you all get what I'm saying...
It's my understanding that you can use whatever keys you want, so long as you own enough licenses to cover what you have installed. This was the case for us when we were audited a couple years ago anyway.
When you get a key from MS VLSC it doesn't ask which agreement you want the key applied to, it just gives you your key and tells you how many times you've activated with that key. For example, we only have 2 SA licenses, but our windows 10 key shows like 7/50 activations...
That is kind of how I though it worked. I guess it's probably the best way to keep one's sanity in IT..
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You only need one VL license of Windows 10 to image everything in your environment. So I think you are fine. It is super rare that you buy more than one copy of Windows 10 through VL.
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@scottalanmiller said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
You only need one VL license of Windows 10 to image everything in your environment. So I think you are fine. It is super rare that you buy more than one copy of Windows 10 through VL.
He's not talking about imaging. I mean he is in the end, but the first part is jsut about buying licenses.
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@JaredBusch said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
@scottalanmiller said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
You only need one VL license of Windows 10 to image everything in your environment. So I think you are fine. It is super rare that you buy more than one copy of Windows 10 through VL.
He's not talking about imaging. I mean he is in the end, but the first part is jsut about buying licenses.
I know, but I was worried that he was buying licenses for imaging (or install), neither of which they can be used for.
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@dave247 said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
What is the "right way" to handle this?
One key, unlimited installs. That's the VL way for Windows desktops.
Installs don't use keys from VL, only imaging and upgrades do. VL Windows 10 licensing cannot be used for the initial install, it requires an OEM or Retail Box license first.
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If you want to increase your license count under your old agreement make sure to give you VAR your agreement number and tell them to add the licenses to that agreement. I have no clue how that works on the backend - but they absolutely can do this as long as they are the ones actually selling the VLSC based licenses.
Then what you'll see is a single agreement, but there will be two licenses under that single agreement, one for 20 and one for 5. I believe in this case you still technically get new MAKs, but as mentioned by @bnrstnr that really doesn't matter. As long as you are using as many or less than you have in your VLSC pool, you're fine.
Also, Look at your MAK pool count now. Typically if you have less than 50 licenses, the MAK pool is 50, so you already have more activations than you've purchased.
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@scottalanmiller said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
@JaredBusch said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
@scottalanmiller said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
You only need one VL license of Windows 10 to image everything in your environment. So I think you are fine. It is super rare that you buy more than one copy of Windows 10 through VL.
He's not talking about imaging. I mean he is in the end, but the first part is jsut about buying licenses.
I know, but I was worried that he was buying licenses for imaging (or install), neither of which they can be used for.
What? .. can you expand on this?
To clarify, I have purchased 30 Dell OptiPlex computers as well as 30 Windows 10 Pro licenses (one MAK) from my VAR. They've actually come with Windows 10 already installed but I'm using MDT to create and deploy a custom Windows 10 image - using the Windows 10 ISO from the MSVLC and the license I purchased added into the MDT task settings.
Now, I would like to install Windows 10 on a few slightly older Dell computers which had Windows 7 on them, hence the additional volume licenses needed.
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@dave247 As long as you're putting the same edition (probably Pro) that came on the computers you don't need a volume license for every one, because they're already licensed for that edition from Dell. You only need new licenses for computers you want to upgrade from 7, 8.1, etc.
You need a single volume license to get imaging rights.
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@bnrstnr said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
@dave247 As long as you're putting the same edition (probably Pro) that came on the computers you don't need a volume license for every one, because they're already licensed for that edition from Dell. You only need new licenses for computers you want to upgrade from 7, 8.1, etc.
You need a single volume license to get imaging rights.
Yes, I kind of forgot about this, but this is what I did. I purchased workstations with Windows 10 Pro on them and then a single VL for imaging rights. Then, I created a custom Windows 10 image and used this single MAK for activating the images (automatically in MDT task sequence). the Workstations haven't had any issues activating or anything.. but maybe I didn't need to do that part.
I guess this makes my original question pointless now since I realize I am talking about a whole different situation.
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@dave247 said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
used this single MAK for activating the images (automatically in MDT task sequence). the Workstations haven't had any issues activating or anything.. but maybe I didn't need to do that part.
You might not have needed to use the MAK in the MDT on those machines, it's hard to say. Jared seems to think all the media is the same today - I'm not so sure. I think you can only use MAK's with VLSC media.
That said - the 20 Windows 10 licenses you purchased for the 20 new machines was unnecessary. You only needed to buy one.
But, since you're now upgrading some Windows 7, 8, 8.1 machines, you can use those 19 other licenses to upgrade those machines (heck, maybe even all 20 of them).
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@Dashrender said in question about increasing MS volume licensing:
I think you can only use MAK's with VLSC media.
I know tht is not true 100%
My desktop Windows 10 VM was made with the public MS ISO download. It is activated with a MAK from VLSC.
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@dave247 How much would the Win10 subscription be in comparison? With that you get a lot of goods.
For example:
Windows 10 Enterprise E3https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/deployment/windows-10-enterprise-subscription-activation
