A new activation crack method has been discovered and implemented to bypass Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 activation: remove and disable Windows Activation Technologies (WAT, older versions were referred to as Windows Genuine Advantage). The hack in question works by bypassing activation altogether, and thus does not require a product key. By blocking, preventing, removing, and disabling access to, or the loading of, all activation and licensing related Windows system files, slui.exe (the exe required to activate Windows 7) will fail to start, resulting in the permanent circumvention of Windows activation.
Still, disabling WAT isn't the end of the story: after the 30-day evaluation period is expired, Windows 7 will still start nagging the user to activate the operating system, the wallpaper will be set to black, and a watermark saying 'This copy of Windows is not genuine' will be placed in the bottom right-hand corner. You can continue to use the operating system indefinitely, but the side-effects can be annoying, so pirates have created tools to clean these up.
Most of the tools support all editions of Windows 7 (32-bit and 64-bit) and Windows Server 2008 R2. In addition to removing and disabling WAT from the Windows system, the tools clean up the side-effects by stopping relevant services and patching certain DLL files.
However, by disabling and turning off the activation component of Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2, after the free trial evaluation activation free period of 30 days is expired, nag screen to notify and remind user to run genuine Windows and activate Windows 7 may appear from balloon tip at notification system tray, or when launching to run NotePad, WordPad, Calculator or even when opening Control Panel.
During the early days of Windows Vista, pirates also tried to permanently bypass Windows Vista activation by stopping the activation grace period countdown timer. These attempts were foiled by Microsoft with updates to the operating system, and we can expect the same to occur this time around since this method involves patching many system files, especially with the next WAT update or with Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2.
The most reliable way to bypass Windows product activation is still the use of BIOS emulation tools to fool the operating system into thinking it has been preloaded onto an OEM system. This can be done either via software tools or through direct modification of a motherboard's BIOS. Pirates have been using BIOS loaders and OEM BIOS mods for Windows 7 for months, and of course even longer for Vista. In fact, in April 2007, Microsoft publicly stated it was analyzing BIOS hacks that were being used to bypass Windows Vista product activation but to this day many of the BIOS methods still work.
Hat tip to My Digital Life.
Windows Server machine users might often need to use Remote Desktop to perform some tasks. However, Remote Desktop service is disabled by default on all versions of Windows operating system. You need to manually enable Remote Desktop before you can use it to perform remote connections between computers. This post shows three different ways to enable/disable Remote Desktop in Windows Server 2008.
Way 1: Enable/Disable Remote Desktop via Computer Properties
Step 1: Right-click on Computer and select Properties.
Step 2: After System window opens, click on the Remote settings link on the left side.
Step 3: After it opens the System Properties dialog with Remote tab selected, you can see Remote Desktop in the disabled state – 'Don't allow connections to this computer'. To enable it, select Allow Connections from computers running any version of Remote Desktop (less secure) or Allow connections only from computers running Remote Desktop with Network Level Authentication (more secure). Click OK if prompted with the security dialog box. Then click Apply to save the changes.
Step 4: After finished the above three steps, Remote Desktop has been enabled on the Windows Server 2008/R2 computer and any members of the Administrators group can connect to this computer. If you want to grand rights for more users to remotely access to this computer, click Select Users, and then add more users to the list.
Tips: See How to Add Remote Desktop Users in Windows PC to learn more.
Way 2: Enable/Disable Remote Desktop via Group Policy Editor
Step 1: Search gpedit.msc in the Start menu. Then in the program list, click gpedit.msc.
Step 2: After Local Group Policy Editor opens, expand Computer Configuration –> Administrative Templates –> Windows Components –> Remote Desktop Services –> Remote Desktop Session Host –> Connections. Then on the right-side pane, double-click on Allow users to connect remotely using Remote Desktop Services.
Step 3: Select Enabled and click Apply if you want to enable Remote Desktop. Select Disabled and click Apply if you need to disable it.
Way 3: Enable/Disable Remote Desktop via Registry Editor
Step 1: Press Win + R key combination to open Run dialog box. Type regedit and click OK.
Step 2: After Registry Editor opens, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlTerminal Server. Then on the right-side pane, double-click on the fSingleSessionPerUser.
Step 3: Set the value data to 0 and click OK if you want to enable Remote Desktop. Set the value to 1 and click OK if you need to disable it.
Step 4: Restart computer to make the changes take effect.
The above are three common methods to enable or disable Remote Desktop in Windows Server 2008/R2. Actually, it is the fourth method via Command Prompt window. As the command line to be entered is a bit long, it will not be covered in this article.
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