How do I get an error reason from InstallProductKey (SoftwareLicensingService) in PowerShell?

Question

I\'m using some PowerShell functions to configure Windows product keys and activation. I get an instance of the SoftwareLicensingService and call InstallProductKey, like this. T

Answer 1

As far as I can see there's no message there. Adding these to your trap:

$_ | fl * -Force
$_.Exception | fl * -Force

Returns everything that is there in the exception and there is nothing useful. So I googled a bit and found a piece of C# code here: http://www.dozty.com/?tag=change-windows-7-product-key-c-sharp They were cathcing ManagementException and in C# it seemed to work a bit better. I have rewritten that code into PowerShell and was trying to catch ManagementException, but without luck:

trap [Exception]
{
[System.Management.ManagementException] $_
break
}
$classInstance = new-object System.Management.ManagementObject("root\CIMV2","SoftwareLicensingService.Version=`"6.1.7600.16385`"", $null);
$inParams = $classInstance.GetMethodParameters("InstallProductKey")
$inParams["ProductKey"] =  "12345-12345-12345-12345-12345"
$classInstance.InvokeMethod("InstallProductKey", $inParams, $null)

It throws: Cannot convert the "System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException (0xC004F050)"