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activation error 0xC004F050



 
 
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  #1  
Old March 5th 19, 04:19 PM posted to alt.comp.os.windows-10
Yarwell
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 3
Default activation error 0xC004F050

Just took delivery yesterday 04/03/2019 - of my brand new (sealed in
box) Lenovo T480s i7 Laptop. Spent 1/2 a day configuring, updating to
1809 etc.,

Less than 24 hours later I notice :- “activation error 0xC004F050” in :-
Settings\Update & Security\Activation (RHS middle of the page) – however
at the top of the page it also says “Windows is activated with a digital
license”

IS THIS NORMAL ??? – otherwise I’m at a loss to understand how this
could have happened, the Win10 Pro factory install & few programs I have
installed are all completely legitimate – (i.e.)

Pale Moon, Sophos Anti-Virus, Adobe DC, Office 2003 and Macrium Reflect
– which I used to create my 1st backUp.

I have seen this error notification before - on other computers & was
never able to find a solution – however this is the 1st time on a brand
new “out of the box” computer.

Guidance, comments or assistance gratefully received.

P.S.: I do not & never have had a Microsoft Account – nor do I want my
name being on the MS database.



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  #2  
Old March 5th 19, 04:32 PM posted to alt.comp.os.windows-10
123456789[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 239
Default activation error 0xC004F050

Yarwell wrote:

P.S.: I do not & never have had a Microsoft Account – nor
do I want my name being on the MS database.


Use a fake/throwaway email address...
  #3  
Old March 5th 19, 05:52 PM posted to alt.comp.os.windows-10
Paul[_32_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 11,873
Default activation error 0xC004F050

Yarwell wrote:
Just took delivery yesterday 04/03/2019 - of my brand new (sealed in
box) Lenovo T480s i7 Laptop. Spent 1/2 a day configuring, updating to
1809 etc.,

Less than 24 hours later I notice :- “activation error 0xC004F050” in :-
Settings\Update & Security\Activation (RHS middle of the page) – however
at the top of the page it also says “Windows is activated with a digital
license”

IS THIS NORMAL ??? – otherwise I’m at a loss to understand how this
could have happened, the Win10 Pro factory install & few programs I have
installed are all completely legitimate – (i.e.)

Pale Moon, Sophos Anti-Virus, Adobe DC, Office 2003 and Macrium Reflect
– which I used to create my 1st backUp.

I have seen this error notification before - on other computers & was
never able to find a solution – however this is the 1st time on a brand
new “out of the box” computer.

Guidance, comments or assistance gratefully received.

P.S.: I do not & never have had a Microsoft Account – nor do I want my
name being on the MS database.


I can try and explain how it works, but you'll have
to fill in the details (debug it) yourself.

In the old days, laptops from OEMs used the "SLIC" method. SLIC
is an ACPI table, passed from the BIOS to the OS at boot time.
SLIC contains a table that says "I'm a Lenovo computer". It might
take 10KB of information to say that, and presumably some crypto
is involved. Even non-branded computing devices have a SLIC
table, but those tables contain "digital noise" and don't do
anything.

In the case of SLIC, the SLIC table doesn't have a license key.
The OS on the other hand, has a "generic" "Lenovo" key. The
combination of "Lenovo key" plus "I'm a Lenovo computer"
results in... activation.

A benefit of this scheme, is SLIC allows you to use multiple
Lenovo OSes. You could use Lenovo WinXP, Vista, Win7 on your
laptop if it has a Lenovo SLIC. All you need, is hardware
drivers (usually that's the sticking point).

*******

OK, fast forward to Win8 and Win10.

The table in the BIOS changed to MSDM. MSDM contains an
actual key, and the key value is "unique" on each computer.
This is why there is *no* COA sticker on your computer.
Since the key is stored in the BIOS, there's no sticker to
get scratched up and destroyed.

It also means, the key is for a specific OS. If it wasn't
for the "free upgrade" scheme we use today to get Win10,
the Win8 key on a Win8 laptop, would only be usable for
Win8. The MSDM table and the key it contains, are really
only intended to activate *one* version of OS. But, due to the
mechanics of the Free Upgrade, it's also possible for an
MSDM Win8 key to cause an installation of Windows 10 to work.

But if Microsoft makes Windows 11 tomorrow, the MSDM key
you've got, won't necessarily activate it. The MSDM method
isn't quite as generous.

*******

When you get a new computer, it's in OOBE state. (Out of
Box Experience state.) It doesn't have a user account set up
yet. That's one way to tell, whether the Best Buy put a
customer return back into the box, without resealing or
restoring the factory setup.

On a new computer, you should be prompted for account details.

If you "pull the network plug", Windows 10 will be less
pestilent about setting up a Microsoft Account, and that
can make it easier to set up a Local Account. You can
switch to an MSA later, for access to purchases from the
Win10 Store, or to use Cloud features. Usually, messing
around with the two account types, results in problems
with the name of the home directory, or with getting
file sharing to work right (without having to log in
to other machines on your LAN and losing easy double-click
navigation).

OK, so we've filled in our account name and some other details.

Now, the OS isn't activated when in the OOBE state.
It considers its options.

Since this is Windows 10, it "sniffs" for MSDM. If it finds
one, it uploads the key, and can make a claim that a digital
entitlement has been registered with the Microsoft server.

My guess is, the process is an interactive one, and all that's
wrong is that some part of the MS Server is overloaded, and
that's where the goofy status is coming from.

If you had set up an MSA and activated the machine, I don't
know how the MS license server handles a "change of ownership"
where a new MSA is referenced to a particular MSDM key.
(Like, say a customer returns a machine to Best Buy
and had activated "Wally" MSA against "Key 1234". Then you
come along and run the OOBE when you get what you think
is a brand new machine, and activate "Yarwell" MSA
against "Key 1234". I don't know how the server
handles that case.)

When there are licensing issues, a Microsoft phone support
person can use the MSA, to bring up the licensing details
of the machine on their screen. If you used a Local Account,
it's not the end of the world, but there would be one
less thing for the Support to use.

*******

This article shows someone wanting a copy of their license
key (without using MagicalJellyBean or some newer tool
that knows MSDM). This is a relatively "plaintext" way to
do it.

https://superuser.com/questions/6379...ux-environment

You could extract that key and feed it to the OS. There
should be a license key change dialog in there somewhere,
and you could try passing it the MSDM key value.

*******

To learn more about your OS:

1) Right-click Start, then Run, then run "control"
When the Control Panel opens on the Task Bar, right click the
icon and select "Pin to TaskBar". This will give you easy
future access to Control Panels (it's no longer in the menu).

In Control Panels, execute "System". In there, you will find
a declaration of what version of Windows you're running, including
the "bitness". It's likely x64 and using 64-bit instructions.

2) Start : Run : "winver"

will tell you the major release and the patch level.

3) If you enter Setup Wheel, you can change the shell window
from Powershell, back to Command Prompt. Then, when you
right click Start orb, you will see "Command Prompt" and
"Administrator Command Prompt" as options.

Using some flavor of Command Prompt, you can try

slmgr /dlv

which will dump information on your license status. The
GUI of course, works just as well for this purpose. But,
the command is available if you want to try,

4) Some flavor of

slui 4

or similar, may allow changing the license key. This might
be reserved for cases where you have the MSDM key in hand,
and want to try your hand at pretending "it's a new key".
Do a Google and see if that's the correct option. I don't
have a table of values.

Anyway, I don't think there is a reason to panic quite yet.
The grace period is 30 days. And Windows 10 doesn't behave
quite as nasty as some of the previous OSes. If your status
doesn't clear in a couple days, post back.

Since you've invested your time and energy putting programs
on the machine, take that backup hard drive you bought and
do a backup of C: now. That way, if your attempts to fiddle
with the license key make things worse for any reason,
just restore from backup.

If you need free backup software, there is this. And yes,
you do want to make the emergency boot CD when it prompts
you, as you cannot put C: back on the computer from your
backup, unless you boot from the emergency CD (or equivalent).

https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree

No matter what backup product you're happy with, *always*
make the emergency CD for it. Or, you will be sorry later.

I generally recommend buying a "six pack" of optical media when
buying a new computer. That will give sufficient materials
to do any backups on the first day, that the machine might
request. But if you're going to that much trouble, you might
was well buy a "stubby cake box" of media, as you will
inevitably run into more things you should be backing up
or making. The stores don't have good selections of media
any more (I can't get Ritek now, only some CMC which isn't
as good). If purchasing tablets or smaller devices without
optical drive, you can purchase a portable optical drive,
or switch to USB sticks. There aren't really very good
quality USB sticks any more (the latest Sandisk Extreme
I bought, turned out to be a pig).

Paul
  #4  
Old March 5th 19, 06:37 PM posted to alt.comp.os.windows-10
😉 Good Guy 😉
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,483
Default activation error 0xC004F050

On 05/03/2019 15:19, Yarwell wrote:


Guidance, comments or assistance gratefully received.



For a genuine big brand machine, you don't have to do anything. It just
activates in the background. Just create your two local accounts (you
don't need a Microsoft Account to use a machine) and that's it. there
is nothing else for you to do on it. You get automatic updates and it
also activates in the background.

You must be coming from that junk OS so you start fiddling the settings
and you;ll find it doesn't work. Windows is supposed to work out of the
box. Stupid users start messing around and their machine becomes unusable.

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Subject: activation error 0xC004F050
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