Setting a permanent Windows Hostname on EC2

In less than obvious fashion, Amazon EC2 Windows Server AMIs reset their hostname on startup due to the Ec2ConfigService. To disable this feature, select ‘EC2ConfigService Settings’ from the start menu, and uncheck the first checkbox under ‘Set Computer Name’

11 thoughts on “Setting a permanent Windows Hostname on EC2

  1. Paras Jethwani

    Good one,

    This behaviour of Amazon EC2 – Windows based hosts – caused us a lot of headache because our software stack was sensitive to host name changes

  2. Strob

    The only problem is that all instance created from that AMI will have the same name…

    I did that and now I can’t revert to the prior behavior… even if I check back the check box on it still keeps the name I gave it… I want to get the instances name by the ip back.

  3. Brian Towers

    Strob:”The only problem is that all instance created from that AMI will have the same name”

    So go into Control Panel/System and change the name by hand to whatever you want.

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