Windows Error message: The Installation was cancelled error or Windows cannot find Microsoft Software license terms.

Microsoft offers product evaluation licenses for users to test and evaluate the full features and functionalities of the product prior to buying the full license. The evaluation versions provide access to full features of the product, but within a limited duration.

Users usually install and run such evaluation systems in virtual environments such as VMWare Workstation for the flexibility and ease of managing the limited software lifecycle.

Users installing the Windows Operating System (OS) evaluation version in a VMWare virtual environment nevertheless get surprised with a Licensing Error such as: Windows cannot find Microsoft Software license terms. or The Installation was cancelled.

The step-by-step how-to shall guide us on solving this license terms error for Windows Server installations in VMWare.

Step 1: Create a new Virtual machine

Option A

1. Click on the Home tab on the upper left corner.
2. Click on “Create new virtual machine” to initiate the new virtual machine creation wizard.

Option B

1. Click on “File” menu on the upper left corner
2. Click on “Create new virtual machine” to initiate the new virtual machine creation wizard.

Step 2: Configure the Virtual machine container for the Guest operating system

1. Select the appropriate virtual machine container configuration (that is; Typical option with basic straightforward automatic configuration options or Customized with advanced and manual configuration options).
2. Click next for the “Guest operating system installation” source and options prompt.
3. Select “I will install the operating system later”. This creates an empty Virtual machine container without a hard disk for the Operating System (OS). The OS will be loaded at a later stage.
4. Click next for the “Guest operating system selection” prompt. This is where you select the Guest Operating System and version which will be installed on the Virtual machine container.
5. Click next to set an appropriate “name” for the new Virtual machine. Then set an appropriate location for saving the Virtual machine files.
6. Click Next to review the configurations, and click Finish to finalize and save the configurations.

Step 3: Selecting and installing the Guest Operating System in the Virtual machine container

1. Click to select the newly created Virtual machine container from the left panel containing the list of available Virtual machines.
2. Click “Edit virtual machine settings” on the right panel containing the virtual machine details and settings. This opens the virtual machine hardware settings panel for making applicable configurations settings.
3. Click to select the CD/DVD settings option from the list of available hardware settings options.
4. Click ”Connect at power on” to set the “Device options” configurations to connect the CD/DVD whenever the virtual machine powers on.
5. Choose the applicable “Connection” option for the CD/DVD (that is; either Use a physical drive or Use ISO image file). We will use and ISO file for our setup.
6. Click “Browse” to select the applicable ISO file for installing the Guest operating system.
7. Click “Ok” to finalize the setup.

Step 4: Power on the Virtual machine with Windows Server 2019 Guest operating system ISO loaded

1. Click on “Power on this virtual machine” to start the newly created and virtual machine with Guest operating system.
2. We can see from the images ii, iii, and iv that the error isn’t showing anymore.