alt Hacker NewsWhat does this mean for using Windows in air gapped environments? I would have assumed this was common enough to make Microsoft want to support it.
Is it possible to activate via a web browser on a separate computer, similar to the flow for phone activation?
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As per the article:
Now when trying to activate the OS by attempting to call the phone number for Microsoft Product Activation, an automated voice response says the following: "Support for product activation has moved online. For the fastest and most convenient way to activate your product, please visit our online product activation portal at aka.ms/aoh"
By logging in with your account, it will not associate the account to the licenses.
I don't think regular Windows 11 is that useful in those cases. You probably either want an intranet connected Windows client, that gets activated and updated via a local server. Probably also a LTSC release, that doesn't get feature updates all the time.
Or a Windows 11 IoT image, that only enables some specific features, and is stripped down for a specific purpose.
For individual use I guess the solution is to set it up once with internet connectivity and air gap afterwards.
Key management services or Active Directory activation.
This is a small roadbump to home/smb free activations.
VAMT proxy activation, or full fledged volume licensing with KMS
you probably need to stand up a key management server (KMS)
Internal key activation can be done through a KMS host , which can be activated by phone (or some other dedicated mean if you're big enough for MS to care)
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/get-started...
Microsoft is the US military's biggest supplier. There is definitely a solution for this. And that solution is probably not available to regular users.