1606 Error when trying to update or install

Anyone?

Are you running the update under your logon?
Try changing to logon to someone elses, or even try using an administrator logon

Then try the update

Yes, I'm running under my logon, which has admin rights.

I'm pretty sure it's a key int he registry that points to nothing and thus the installer cannot find the path.

Does anyone know exactly what keys the installer uses when installing files?

How can I log what the installer is trying to do?

Can anyone tell me how to debug this?

It happens at the point of checking space requirements.

I haven't added or removed any drives, nor have I connected or disconnected from any network devices. I even tried disabling the network card to no avail.

The machine doesn't have an admin account as far as I can see. Windows Vista Home Premium.

Can you try under antother logon whihc has admin rights
If there are no others, create one.

The issue could be directly related to your user profile

I have just created a new admin user and logged in as them.

I have exactly the same problem.

So I guess it's not a profile problem.

I even did a system restore to back over a month ago (before I had the problem), this makes no difference either. (So much for system restore)

So does anyone know what reg keys the installer is checking when "computing space requirements"?

Further information:

I checked the install log and I found this entry which looks very suspect to me.

Can anyone tell me where I can find the variable (I'm guessing reg key or environment variable) which determines what this is finally set to:

MSI (s) (DC:2C) [13:07:12:172]: PROPERTY CHANGE: Modifying COMMONAPPDATA_TI_DIR property. Its current value is 'C:\ProgramData\Intuit\QuickBooks 2012\Components\TI'. Its new value: ' :'.

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I am sure this is not specific to QB, because my updates fail with the same error, although I can't find a way to view the installer logs from them.

Thanks, Marty

If its an issue with windows installer

You should be able to repair it, by running a repair on the Operating System

Boot the PC using the OS install MEdia
Then CHoose the Repair Option

I've done a safemode repair windows, but that didn't work. Still the same error.

Whats a safemode repair windows?

I couldnt be sure that thats the same as running a repair on the OS with the original Media

Using the original media, it will remove all of the default windows registry settings, apps, services ect ect and recreate them

Problem is, when you have a laptop with OEM windows, it doesn't come with a disc for windows, only a "wipe and reinstall everything" option.

You only have a wipe and reinstall option?

What about a re-install?

What version of windows is it?
Whats the manufacturer of the PC?

haha I'm not reinstalling windows just to fix an installer error, that's insane.

Modern manufacturers don't give windows discs with PC's anymore, it's OEM'd.

The do usually give a seperate partition with FULL reinstall option, but not just windows to do a repair.

It's a PC World Advent PC running Vista Home Premium.

Unfortunatley, in previous cases ive had/seen with Windows Installer being broken this was the only option that worked.

You could possibly try running the install for Windows Installer 4.5
Hopefully running the install will repair it

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=8483

Although, if installer is broken this may not work

Hi Apache09,

I've tried that, it says the installer isn't require to be installed.

Does anyone know where I can find the entries the installer looks at to determine space requirements? Because that's when the error comes up.

If I could find that, I could delete / remake the reg entry from another PC.

Losing the will to live with windows.

Thanks,

Marty

Copying over registry entries from another machine probably not a good idea
Especially windows installer, as registry entries are much more integrated than they appear.
Especailly in Vista or Windows 7

Have a look at the current entries in the Registry, I think you will see what i mean
 •[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Installer]
 •[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Installer]
 •[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer]


How much space is avaialable on the Drive?

Just an idea here

Have you tried booting to Safe mode and running the install/update there?
does it act any different


Failing that, I honestly think the quickest and easiest way to fix this will be to re-run the install from the Manufacturer restore CD/DVD.

So you dont loose much, you can use Windows Easy Transfer in Vista to backup all your User(s) Profile Settings and Files.

Save the Profile to a USB Drive or External Hard Drive

RUn the restore
Then run Windows Easy Transfer again to re import the USer Settings and Files in the profile

Hi,

I will try that when I get home.

Maybe from a different angle, can you tell me where to look for known locations in the registry. i.e. any location that the installer *may* look. network drives, local drives, USB's, recent folders, etc.

Maybe I have a corrupt network -> drive letter assignment, or a USB drive that didn't unmount properly.

Where would these be stored in the registry?

Thanks,

Marty

Corrupt Network?

Are you trying to run that update, or other updates, from or over a Network Location?
Ideally Should copy the updates to the Local PC, then Run the update.

However, i dont think this is your issues, as the issue really appears to be with the OS

If Drive letter assignment was off or if you had an USB Drive still mounted you would see this by: Right CLick on MY COmputer>Manage>Disk Management

Everything is local. The issue happens when I either update quickbooks or try to install windows updates (although only the latest 13 of them - I did a rollback to over 2 months ago and it asked to do the updates, they all installed except 3 of them)

This is why I think it's an issue with some drive device that is corrupt or not there when the installer is trying to compute space requirements, but I cannot for the life of me find what or where it is.

Just did a repair from the "restore partition", that didn't work.

I did an sfc /scannow which said it found errors but couldn't replace the files, but I cannot see them. Can anyone read the file log and let me know what's going on? Thanks.
CBS.log

As an update, I cannot even repair my Office 2007, I get the same error.

I've been in the industry almost 20 years and in that time, Microsoft software has become more and more buggy. Now, it's almost impossible to debug their vauge clueless error messages.

I just WISH bigger companies, like Intuit, Adobe CS, etc, started making their software for Linux, then I could dump this rubbish that is Microsoft.

I've had this issue over a month, and I trawl the internet every day looking for a fix, I've even enlisted the professionals and they don't seem to know. This is clearly rediculous.

If this were a broken down car, the *fix* as Microsoft would suggest, would be to strip it down to its component parts and rebuild it. NOT good enough. This wouldn't be necessary if the MS Coders wrote the code and error-management properly.

Rant over. This is so frustrating because my computer is now basically useless unless I reinstall Windows.

From the install log pointed to by the 1203 event produced by Quickbooks update:

MSI (s) (08:04) [16:34:19:808]: PROPERTY CHANGE: Adding COMMONAPPDATA_TI_DIR property. Its value is 'C:\ProgramData\Intuit\QuickBooks 2012\Components\TI'.
MSI (s) (08:04) [16:34:19:808]: PROPERTY CHANGE: Modifying COMMONAPPDATA_TI_DIR property. Its current value is 'C:\ProgramData\Intuit\QuickBooks 2012\Components\TI'. Its new value: ' :'.

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The directory is correct, then something is changing it!

From the install log pointed to by the 1203 event produced by Windows Update:

MSI (s) (1C:FC) [15:29:36:399]: PROPERTY CHANGE: Adding Excel_ODReg property. Its value is ' :'.
MSI (s) (1C:FC) [15:29:36:399]: PROPERTY CHANGE: Adding PowerPoint_ODReg property. Its value is ' :'.
MSI (s) (1C:FC) [15:29:36:399]: PROPERTY CHANGE: Adding Word_ODReg property. Its value is ' :'.

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I'm assuming Excel_ODReg means Excel Office Directory Registry Entry.

Again, everything else seems fine until this property is changed.

Can ANYONE tell me what is changing these? I'm thinking there's a global variable or reg entry that has been deleted/corrupted that covers this, that would make sense, but I don't know what it is.

Just thinking you mentioned you did a roll back to over 2 months ago?
Was this a system restore?

If it was, you mentioned all updates were applied all but 3.
This would indicate that installer was working back then

Can you re-run the system restore back to this time.
Make sure that automatic updates it turnned off..

And see how installer goes.

Yes, I tried that.

I System Restored back to 2 months ago, tried to install the Quickbooks update and it failed with the same error. Ran Windows Update which updated all but the same 13 update, with the same error.

In a nutshell, the installer was still broken after the 2 month rollback.

Can you go back any furthur than 2 motnhs?

No, unfortunately not. But I'm sure within those 2 months I've done a Quickbooks update successfully. So it should've reverted back to a working install procedure, but it hasn't.

I've just fixed / reinstalled .net 3.5 and 4, tried to install windows installer 4.5 (but it says it's for my system even though it's the correct one from M$), tried a sfc /scannow, tried a reinstall of Office (failed with the same error as Quickbooks).

I'm at the end of the road with this :-(

Yes, I think this is dead in the water. I've just bought a Mometus XT 750Gb 2.5" drive and a copy of Windows 7 HP. I'm going to remove my HDD and install those two, then copy over the data. Much safer that way.

But I will be making sure I dual boot to Ubuntu too and sharing the data partition with both.

That makes the most sense.