Fix broken program installs on Vista with Windows Installer Cleanup
By Jonathan Schlaffer
There are some cases where Windows just doesn’t like the program you are trying to install or get rid of and occasionally the installer/uninstaller hangs. At this point you can try restarting or you may have to power off manually. The problem arises when you get back to Windows, it will no longer let you install/repair or uninstall the program you were working with. This is fixable.
Only use this utility if you have received an error in the Add/Remove Programs (Windows 95 to XP) or Programs and Features (Windows Vista) while attempting to repair/uninstall a program, there may be a problem with the Windows Installer or routines required to execute the operation. Errors may also occur during reinstallation attempts.
For your convenience, Microsoft provides a little known utility called Windows Installer Cleanup and it does exactly what it says. This utility cleans up any mess an incomplete install/uninstall leaves behind and repairs the files required to complete the operation.
After downloading and installing the Cleanup utility, it will automatically run and scan for any incomplete operations, almost no action is required on your part except to click next.
If it found (and repaired) an operation and program files you may now go back to the Control Panel and install/repair/uninstall the program you were working with.
Windows Installer Cleanup works with Windows 95 and all versions right up to and including Vista.
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on Sunday, December 16th, 2007 at 2:49 pm
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January 13th, 2008
yea that’s nice.. it doesn’t run on vista.. gives a permission denied error 800a0046 ms vbscript runtime error. ms sucks.
January 14th, 2008
Joe, It does run on Vista, in fact Microsoft says it works with every version of Windows since 95. It would be more accurate to say that “it doesn’t work on your installation of Vista” which is probably an indicator that you have a more serious issue than broken installations.
A quick search reveals this is likely caused by one or more corrupted runtime files. It’s not Vista’s fault, not really.
I’m not sure what kind of error it would toss up if you weren’t logged in as admin, it has to be run under an administrator account.
Suffice it to say, I’ve run this on around a dozen computers running both XP and Vista and have had zero problems.
January 19th, 2008
noo Jow is write it doesnt work i bought my pc 6 months ago and it says the same shi.t cant beilvie this man…
January 19th, 2008
See above comment…
March 10th, 2008
WICU works fine if run as admin.
http://www.winhelponline.com/articles/170/1/Error-800A0046—Permission-Denied-when-installing-the-Windows-Installer-Cleanup-Utility-in-Windows-Vista.html