1

Hi All,

I thought I’d check out the product keys for MS products on our network. I’m mainly interest in windows licenses. I have a report which I’ve run in the past and all look pretty complete. I’ve recently rerun it after removing all the inventory and starting from scratch.

Alas, I have 4 licenses codes showing with a network of over 30 windows devices. I’ve searched and wandered around the settings to see if there is something I can do but I cannot find anything.

Has anyone else had this issue and resolved it? Should I do a complete uninstall and reinstall of spiceworks? Or maybe just delete all the inventory and start from scratch?

I have SW on 3 servers. 2 set as remotes sending data to a central installation.

Cheers.

6 Spice ups
2

There are almost no software that can extract licence keys or product keys from MS products as the keys and/or serial numbers are not kept in the OSe.

The keys are entered during the activation process then matched with product type and product ID or serial number is created.

You maybe able to get the license keys from the product serial number (usually a 25 digit that is used if you have activation issues)…but this would usually be a different license key from your retail or MSVL keys.

3

Thanks Adrian. Maybe things have changed with SW. I remember there used to product keys that you could run a report to list all product keys and then use the license manager to ensure things were pretty tight.

4

Some products that keep keys in registry…some do not…

Some use product keys, then have a generator then keep the “activated keys” while dropping the product keys.

5

You could always use magical jellybean key finder or Belarc to get you the windows keys

6

IIRC Magical Jellybean can’t do anything newer than Windows 7 and Office 2010 because Microsoft started encrypting keys as of Windows 8 and Office 2013. That’s also why Spiceworks and other tools can’t pull them anymore.

7

Since Windows 7 and Office 2013 all keys are encrypted in the registry, and there is no way to get them, SW included.

This also applies to many other product, Adobe included.

8

Ah. Then maybe something has changed. Probably something in my head rather than anything else.

There was a time when SW would help with license codes and verified usage as well as pulling the installation key from the OS. I have a report which was run some time ago which did list product keys for Windows XP and above. Now the same report is empty. If SW cannot get the keys then I really must have done something else with SW myself.

Thank you for all your input.

Chris

9

You can manually input keys, but it doesn’t track usage or assignee in the way in which I think you would want to use it.

If you want a license management system, I highly recommend Snow Inventory this will integrate with Microsoft SAM and any EA/SA you have and can track licenses and usage, but of course this is not free.