SQL Management Studio 2008 R2 Express – 1603

If you are attempting to install the SQL Management Studio 2008 R2 Express for x64 on a Windows 7 system you might have quite a few installation errors. One that was consistently bugging me was a generic 1603 from the trin_aide_cpu32_1.log. This indicated a failure for the VSTA modules. The failure from the above log looked like this;

11/09/11 13:50:08 DDSet_Error: The Commandline ‘”C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5\addinutil.exe” -PipelineRoot:”C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\VSTA\Pipeline\.” -Rebuild -Silent’ returned non-zero value: -1073741819.

Running the command from an elevated command-prompt revealed this;

C:\Windows\system32>”C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5\addinutil.exe” -Pip
elineRoot:”C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\VSTA\Pipeline\.”
-Rebuild -Silent
Finished updating cache

For some reason – the above was considered a failure (due to its exit code) and stopped the installation from progressing. Reading a thread in the forums regarding a similar error (but not identical) one possibility that presented itself was to remove the custom action all together. 

Reviewing the folder x64\setup – you can see the below content;

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Trin_aide.msi is the installation-file in question and running it manually does not resolve the issue. Use InstEd to open the file and verify the actions in the table InstallExecuteSequence – normally it’s a good idea to sort that specific table after the sequence column – as it gives you an overview in what order the actions take place.

The following steps relate to our problem;

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You can see the sequence number to the right. The yellow color indicates that the row was removed within an applied MST-file. InstEd (as opposed to Orca) allows you to create a new MST and will show the differences between additions and removals.

Installing the trin_aide.msi with the newly created MST-file resolves the problem – once the file has been installed the Management Studio setup will only verify that all resources are in place and simply bypass the installation altogether.

One thought on “SQL Management Studio 2008 R2 Express – 1603

  1. Luke Reply

    This statement is incorrect: “InstEd (as opposed to Orca) allows you to create a new MST and will show the differences between additions and removals. ”
    Orca most definitely does highlight what has been changed in an MST. It does so with a green box for a change and a green line strike through for a deletion. If you edit the msi directly without creating a mst then you won’t see the changes.

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