Changing SID in Windows 2008

Windows Server 2008 : Change the SID

If you deploy VMs from templates or clone the VMs , all the new machines will have the same SID

(SID = Security Identifier)

For Windows Server 2003 you can use a tool named "NewSID" , but you can't use it for Windows 2008 or Windows 2008 R2 . (if you run it the OS will crash , after rebooting the server the windows recovery will be started on Windows 2008 , and you will get the Blue screen on Windows 2008 R2).

In case you need to change the SID on Windows Server 2008 (R2) , please follow the steps below :


To see the current SID of the computer , you can download a small tool name "PsGetSID" :

It's part of  "PsTools" from Microsoft and you can download the package from this link :

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-ca/sysinternals/bb896649.aspx


We can use the "SysPrep" tool to change the SID :

Run the SysPrep from the Run :

And it will open the location of SysPrep in this folder :

C:\Windows\System32\sysprep

Run the SysPrep file and it will show you "System Preparation Tool" window .

Select the "Generalize" option to change the SID of computer and also select "Enter System Out-Of-Box Experience (OOBE) " :

Press OK to start the process : (it takes few minutes to be completed)

Server will be rebooted :

Now you have to enter some information :

And accept the License terms :

When the system is up and running , copy the PsGetsid file again to the server and run it to make sure the SID has changed :