Lukas Beeler’s IT Blog

Windows Installer is used by almost all newer software packages, and the quality of some of these packages is rather dubious. So from time to time it might happen that Windows Installer hickups, and you aren’t able to remove or repair a program. In other cases, a program might already be deleted, and the Uninstaller falls on it’s face when the program is no longer there.

One particular problem i’ve encountered is upgrading a MSI Package that can sometimes lead to an Error 1706 “No Valid Source Could Be Found”, if you don’t have the original .MSI file anymore. In this case your only option is removing the application (if that still works), and then reinstalling the new version, or just running the Windows Installer Cleanup Tool, and then reinstalling the new application.

Now you usually have two ways to sort this problem out:

Using the Windows Installer Cleanup Tool

Microsoft provides you with the Windows Installer Cleanup Tool. This tool works well in most cases, but remember if the Installation is User- and not Systembased, you’ll need to be logged in with the appropriate user in order to be able to delete the offending Windows Installer entry.

Using regedit

You can find the products in
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Installer\Products

You might be able to modify some settings there, but you can also delete products (you’ll need to look through all of them to find the name that corresponds to the GUID). I do not know if this has negative consequences, but i’ve used this procedure a few times with no ill effects afterwards.