Cannot start software protection service & activate Windows and Microsoft Office

This is a quick post to mention a fix for an annoying problem that cropped up today after Sage had been installing their applications on one of our servers.  It first appeared that Windows was not activated (even though I knew I had done this) and the Software Protection service was unable to start.  It was giving the error Windows could not start the software protection service on Local Computer.  You may also notice that Microsoft Office pops up with an error stating Microsoft Office can’t find your licence for this application.  A repair attempt was unsuccessful or was cancelled.  Microsoft Office will now exit.  I experienced the error on Windows 2012 R2 Server but it seems that this is common on all operating systems above Windows 2008 R2.

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