What?

Convert a Windows 2008 or 2012 Server from Standard > Enterprise > Data-center

Why?

Several reasons including but not limited to:

• You have installed a Standard Edition and realized, it needs to be an Enterprise post deployment of applications and server sign off.
• Your company is looking for moving into Virtual from Physical and there are going to be a lot of machines in Virtual. [with respect to License optimization as purchasing a Data Center License will entitle you to use an unlimited number of VM Guests, of course you have to read thru the license terms to get a full picture, will get a new post on this at the earliest]

How?

1. Check what are the supported upgrade Editions before proceeding.
   • DISM /Online /Get-TargetEditions
   • You will get an output similar to this
     • Editions that can be upgraded to:
       Target Edition : ServerDataCenter
       Target Edition : ServerEnterprise
2. Once you decide which edition you are going to go with, get the License key Ready for that version and issue the command:[In this example, I am intending to upgrade my OS to Datacenter.
   • DISM /Online /Set-Edition:ServerDatacenter /ProductKey:XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX /AcceptEula

Gotchas & Additional Info:

1. You can not downgrade it from an advanced edition.
2. When dealing with Domain controllers, ensure do demote the DC, make the changes and Promote it to a DC.
3. DISM /online /Get-CurrentEdition can be used to get the current OS info