Office 2010 activation fails after SP2 with error 0x80070190

Anonymous
2013-07-23T21:05:23+00:00

Windows 7 Pro, Office 2010 Pro Plus

I put Office 2010 SP2 on three identically configured machines this morning.  Two of them had previously had Office 2010 activated, the third had not yet been activated.  After SP2 was installed, the two machines with previously-activated versions of Office 2010 continue to work correctly;  the third machine demands that I activate Office - the process appears to run, but then fails with error code 0x80070190.

An initial call to Support yielded a request for me to install Hotfix for Windows KB947821.  That installed correctly, but did not fix the problem.  Before I call back, I thought I would put something out here to see if others have come across this problem.

A Google search on the error code keeps coming up with information implying that this may be related to a Beta status in Office 2010.  Is it possible that today's release of SP2 was not final code?

Microsoft 365 and Office | Install, redeem, activate | For home | Windows

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

0 comments
Answer accepted by question author
Anonymous
2013-07-25T16:07:34+00:00

Aha!

I tried using the cscript cmd line process described elsewhere in this thread, and got a new error:

Last 5 characters of installed product key: XXXXX (they matched my MAK key, so the correct product key is already in place)

ERROR CODE: 0xC004F025

ERROR DESCRIPTION: The Software Licensing Service reported that the action requires administrator privilege.

So apparently UAC is getting in the way. 

I found this thread:

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windowsserver/en-US/8f2a5c3e-4e33-4fdb-8eb2-760dbeca0713/error0xc004f025-access-denied-the-requested-action-requires-elevated-priviliges

which led me to this post:

http://www.blogsdna.com/2168/windows-7-how-to-open-elevated-command-prompt-with-administrator-privileges.htm

Which FIXED THE PROBLEM!

The remaining question is, Why is UAC suddenly putting itself in charge of activation *after* SP2 when it did not appear to get involved previously?  I made no changes to UAC on any of the machines where SP2 was installed;  I try to avoid touching UAC as much as possible.

Was this answer helpful?

4 people found this answer helpful.
0 comments

77 additional answers

Sort by: Oldest
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Anonymous
    2014-06-26T15:12:03+00:00

    Thanks.  easier to run elevated this way.

    use file explorer and find excel or winword.exe file in c:\program files\mircosoft office\office14 directory.  Right click on exe and select run as administrator.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  2. Anonymous
    2014-08-11T18:56:11+00:00

    thanks paulNSW worked for me

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  3. Anonymous
    2014-09-11T15:28:17+00:00

    Right click Word shortcut and run as administrator. Thanks for pointing out UAC as the issue.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  4. Anonymous
    2014-12-01T20:42:47+00:00

    I had the same problem, and thanks to the helpful descriptions of the UAC issue, I found an even easier solution...

    1. Go to the Start Menu
    2. Locate Microsoft Word
    3. Right-click and choose "Run as Administrator" (just this one time!)
    4. Activate normally when Word starts up and requests activation
    5. Close Word

    The next time you start Word, it should be fully activated.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments