Installation Returns Error or Appears to Freeze

TOPIC

Interrupted downloads, antivirus programs and hard disk capacity can interfere with the installation of new programs.

DISCUSSION

Over 99% of installation failures of our software are caused by one of:

• Incomplete or corrupt downloads of setup files (most likely)
• Overly "intrusive" antivirus/antimalware software (quite likely)
• Insufficient hard disk space (common)
• Installation of other software not complete yet (common)
• Presence of temporary files from other software installation (rare)

All our executable files are digitally signed, which makes it possible to confirm the integrity of the file. If you right-click the setup file and select Properties, you should be able to verify that it has a valid digital signature. If it hasn't, then this is likely the result of an interrupted download. In this case, we advise to re-download and verify that the new download has a different file size. If the issue issue persists, as often indicated by the size remaining unchanged, and by a lack of digital signature, this probably means that you are re-downloading the same partial or corrupt file from your local browser cache, or from an ISP cache, in which case you can try and press Ctrl to force a cache flush when re-downloading.

If you establish that the setup application has a valid digital signature, and the installation still fails, we advise to temporarily turn off any antivirus/antimalware software that you may be running, and retry the installation. If the antivirus/antimalware software asks you for permission to proceed with an installation step (e.g. copying a file, writing to the registry, etc.), and you do not authorize such step, the installation will be incomplete and the software will most likely not work as intended.

If the installation still fails, this could indicate a low disk space on either the destination partition, or the partition holding the temporary files (Windows "Temp" directory). As a rule of thumb, you should make sure that the partitions that are used have at least 100 MB of disk space, plus three times the size of the setup file itself.

Because our software uses standard Windows installer (MSI) functionality, which is also used by other installers, if a previous installation of another program has not completed yet, any attempt to install new software may trigger the request to complete the previous installation. In this case, make sure to either complete any pending installations of other software, or uninstall such software, if you do not wish to complete said installations. The other software may require a reboot to complete this installation or uninstallation process.

As a last step, if you verified all of the previous steps and you performed a reboot, and installation still fails, you may want to try emptying the temporary directory, to make sure that temporary files which may have been left over by other installations have been removed. There is a known issue with some versions of InstallShield setup packages, which, by not removing certain temporary files, prevent the installation of other programs. To solve this, delete the contents of the "Temp" directory used by the installer. To access this directory type "%temp%" in the path field of an Explorer window. This points to a directory like "C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Temp", "C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Temp", "C:\Windows\Temp", "C:\WinNT\Temp", "C:\Temp", or similar. Some temporary files may be in use, in which case the deletion may not completely succeed, but, unless the procedure which created these temporary files is still in progress (or if it required a reboot which has not yet been performed), it is usually safe to delete the entire contents of these directories.

Also see:

• 3-147 - Installing Software Which Uses Windows Installer