Office 365 not Activating in Windows 10

Question

I have seen a number of posters with the same issue of not being able to activate Office 365 after finally activating Windows 10. I have the exact same issue and unfortunately I have practically exhausted all avenues and all suggestions short of wiping out my system (which is not practical) and starting all over again.

My system:

• Dell Precision M4800 Enterprise
• RAM: 32GB
• HDD: 2 SSD: 250GB Drive 0, 500GB Drive 1
• OS - Windows 10 Enterprise - Activated (after three days of not)
• Installation type - Upgraded (failed due to excessive lockups tracing the problem back to Hyper-V.
• Installation type 2 - Reset to Windows installation without keeping configuration. (Fresh)
• Hyper-V initiated
• Hyper-V adapters installed with the latest drivers
• Wireless & Bluetooth adapters disabled. (although I have attempted to activate through the wireless).

Here is what I'm getting:

After clicking on the Next, I get this (this comes up very quickly as if it can't even reach out through to the internet).

Because I can't post images (not enough reputations) you can simply use your imagination. The message reads, "We're sorry, something went wrong and we can't do this for your right now. Please try again later. (0x8004FC12)."

I have tried everything as I have said:

• Run as Word as administrator. All times
• Uninstall and reinstall Office 365 - 13 times
• Reset windows 10 to a "Clean" install; meaning that it did a fresh reset not keeping anything but the file folders on the drive. Basically, the registry is clean per a clean install of the OS. - 1 time
• Tried unpatching License Key. 2 times
• Tried patching a new license key: does not accept new license key. 2 times
• Tried shutting down the firewall. 1 time
• Tried turning UAC off. 2 times
• Tried deleting all instance of Office15, Office and office 365. 3 times
• Tried deleting additional virtual network adapters. 1 time
• Tried installing both 32 and 64 bit versions (not at the same time)- Various times
• Read through the Help for Licensing Office 365 and doing those steps - 5 times
• Contacted online support to where they sent me to an advance tech support link - 1 time
• Restarted Computer after each installation - Many times
• Cursed at the Office 365 attempts - Many times
• Tried to remove other connected services for Office 365: - failed - 2 times.
• Tried installing .NET Framework 3.5 (not sure why this was important considering it is an older Framework). 1 time

So what I'm gathering is the issue might be related to a connectivity through to the internet activation service provided by Microsoft. However, all indicators are rather quick and even with the slowest connections, are quicker than what would imply a connection attempt.

Therefore the attempt to connect is being restricted somewhere within the OS environment. If anyone can come up with an answer to that, I would forever be appreciative.

If this this laptop had the mic on, it would record hours of epithets from me.

Answer 1

After some serious work on this, I believe I have come up with the solution!

With regards to the installation and Activation of Office 365 in Windows 10 the following steps should be taken in the order I will give.

You can run MS Mr. Fixit:

This will remove all registry of Office 365 (Office 2013) from your Windows OS and will require a reboot.

The article for it is here. Office 2013 uninstall with Microsoft Fix It.

Don't worry, that is a Microsoft Product from Microsoft download sites.

Although this part did remove the registration of Office 2013 from your OS, it doesn't actually fix the issue.

The next part is tricky.

Go to your Office 365 account where you can download the Office 365 Office 2013 product on your system.

Choose your installation type: 32bit or 64bit.

While on this page, you should see your instance of Office installation for your machine you are currently trying to install Office 365 on. There should be an option to DEACTIVATE. Click this and deactivate this title.

After Office completes its installation. Launch MS Word in Administrator mode and it will prompt you with a message that your product isn't licensed and will give you two options.

1. Login into your installation (company) to complete your registration.
2. Enter a license Key.

If you were provided this site from your company to download a company license instance, Office 365 will try to verify your license with through your company's portal once you login.

The second option where the license key is needed to be entered and if your license was given to you by your company, you might find a situation where the following message will appear.

"This product key is for the volume-licensed version of Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2013, which isn't currently installed. To use this product key, contact your administrator."

However, if Office accepts this license, then you can go on with your Office 2013 without incident.

For some reason, known only to Microsoft, the registry of this product doesn't quite match up with the key as provided by your company. The simple login into your company's portal will assign a license and activate it at the same time. I believe this is due to the fact that your company already has an activated multiuser license and logging in validates your copy.

The possible reason for your error, and correct me if I'm wrong, Is when you upgraded to Windows 10, your activated Office 365 is trying to validate with an older Windows OS and outdated information.

Here is a caveat. If you deactivated the account without running the Microsoft Fix it uninstall for Office 2013, then it will still try to read outdated information as Windows 10 will update with whatever outdated information you had and not do any sort of purging process. The process I'm sure is rather lengthy but happens instantaneously.

I hope this helps to clarify other posts that people have made.