Configure Windows Server using EC2 Launch

EC2Launch is a set of Windows PowerShell scripts that replaces the EC2Config service on Windows Server 2016 and later AMIs. On how to launch an EC2 instance on Windows Server 2016, see the following link for more information. Please refer to these articles on Driver Management on AWS, Windows clients, and servers. “How to remove a Printer from Windows 10 via PowerShell, Windows registry and Print Management, how to configure Windows instance using EC2 Launch for Server 2016, how to launch an EC2 instance, and how to apply Windows Updates from WSUS to the server using AWS RunCommand. Kindly follow through the rest of the guide to learn how to Configure Windows Server 2016 using EC2 Launch.

EC2Launch performs the following tasks by default upon initial instance boot.
- Sets up new wallpaper that renders information about the instance. (This doesn't apply to Nano Servers.)
- Sets the computer name.
- Sends instance information to the Amazon EC2 console.
- Sends the RDP certificate thumbprint to the EC2 console. (Doesn't apply to Nano Server.)
- Sets a random password for the administrator account.
- Adds DNS suffixes. Dynamically extends the operating system partition to include any unpartitioned space. Executes user data (if specified). For more information about specifying user data, see Working with Instance User Data.

Note: You can also configure EC2 Launch to perform these tasks during startup, and initialize secondary EBS volumes. You can also send Windows Event logs to the EC2 console logs, and send the Windows is ready to use the message to the EC2 console.

Things to consider before installing EC2 Launch

If you have already installed and configured EC2Launch on an instance, make a backup of the EC2Launch configuration file. The installation process does not preserve changes in this file. By default, the file is located in the

C:\ProgramData\Amazon\EC2-Windows\Launch\Config director

After installing the EC2Launch, If you made a backup of the EC2Launch configuration file, copy it to the path below.

C:\ProgramData\Amazon\EC2-Windows\Launch\Config directory

Download EC2-Windows-Launch.zip

This will replace the existing files there. This step is very important to adhere to. To download and install the latest version of EC2Launch, see the link.

- Download EC2-Windows-Launch.zip to a directory on the instance.
- Download install.ps1 to the same directory where you downloaded EC2-Windows-Launch.zip.
- Run install.ps1

Note: When a Windows Server 2012 having EC2Config already installed not appearing via the RunCommand Instance selection, the first step to troubleshoot this, is to check the version of the Ec2Config service and then Simply Upgrade it.

Upon Installation of the EC2Launch Service or EC2Config Service, the server will be available in the run-command instance selection. If this is not available, check to see if you have AmazonEc2RoleForSSM attached to the instance. For more information on how to install the latest version of EC2 Config, see the link.

I hope you found this blog post helpful on how to Configure Windows Server 2016 using EC2 Launch. If you have any questions, please let me know in the comment session.