For example, to test if there is an Azure Firewall issue, you can run the command “test-netconnection 20.118.99.224 -port 1688”. To resolve the KMS activation issue, add a network rule to the Azure Firewall that allows port 1688 from your source subnet to the new KMS IP addresses (40.83.235.53 and 20.118.99.224) on port 1688.
To check which KMS server the virtual machine is trying to use, you can go to nslookup. You can also see failed attempts to connect to the KMS server running via Azure Traffic Manager via the command “netstat -ano 3 | findstr “SYN_SENT” inside the virtual machine. The symptoms of the KMS activation issue are an application event ID 8198, which states that Licensing Activation (slui.exe) failed with the error code 0xC00F074. This change impacted Azure Virtual Desktop users and caused a licensing popup to appear repeatedly on end-user desktops. However, in October 2022, Microsoft changed the IP addresses of two KMS servers, which caused activation issues for customers in highly constrained environments.
KMS (Key Management Service) activation is essential to activate Windows operating systems in an enterprise environment.
