Why do I get "Window Installer, Preparing to install" each time I boot Windows?

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Finally found it. Ran HijackThis and noticed the following two entries:

URLSearchHook: SrchHook Class - {44F9B173-041C-4825-A9B9-D914BD9DCBB3} - blank (file missing)

URLSearchHook: (no name) - ~CFBFAE00-17A6-11D0-99CB-00C04FD64497} - (no file)

I instructed HijackThis to fix these two, which it does by resetting the registry value to the default value.

No more problem.

I don't know what caused this, probably a spyware program that did not get completely cleaned by my other software, but it is now fixed.

Hope this helps someone.

Did a little more research and I now think the problem was caused by an incomplete uninstall of the Earthlink Total Access software.

Not sure why the installer keeps starting but I have tried every thing. finally I just killed installer itself. Go to "Start"->,"Run", type "services.msc" and press "enter" Double click "Windows Installer" Go to Startup Type and check Disabled then apply, ok . This has stopped the problem but you will have to enable installer again if you are adding new software etc

If you disable installer, and have selected the "automatic update" for Windows, it won't update. Have you run "Hijack This"?

While I'm not a techie, it was pretty easy to figure out this problem started after a recent Windows update. The update erased all my icons for Word 2000 and attempted to replace them with the new trial Office 2003 pack. Also, Winpatrol notified me that Word 2003 was attempting to associate itself with all my Word 2000 docs. I did not allow it to do so. The next day everything seemed to be OK. However, the next evening, out of nowhere, I began to get the "Preparing to Install" message on my screen. However, msie.exe is not listed in my startup programs but after boot is listed in active tasks.Somehow, I think Microsoft screwed everything up by trying to force me to update MY SOFTWARE that I PURCHASED. As you can tell, that gripes me a great deal. Running the services.msc works fine, but it's a shame that Microsoft has to mess with our systems when the pretext is they are supposedly providing "security updates." Since I don't use I.E. or Outlook, am tempted to stay completely away from their "fixes." Of course, the first thing I did when I bought my computer was to disable "Microsoft Snoop," otherwise known as "Automatic Updates." I wonder if we uninstalled the 60-day trial pack if that would make a difference or just make things worse?

I had a very long battle with the 'Preparing to install...' message showing up 3-4 times at startup. I tried a lot of things and used a lot of time but in the end there was only one solution: HijackThis!

It fixed it and the program is very easy to use. Like Floyd said run the program and it will do a quick scan of your computer. Look for entries that seems to be missing their targets like: bla bla bla = (nothing) Fix those (it will make a backup) and restart your computer.

Hope it works for you too like it did for me ;o))

I think we may need to download the fix from the below Microsoft websit :-

http://blogs.msdn.com/windows_installer_team/archive/2005/08/05/448386.aspx

Ran into this problem after I reinstalled Windows XP on my computer after installing a new CPU and motherboard (Windows wouldn't run initially).

After I reinstalled Office I was getting those preparing to install messages every time I ran it. My solution was to uninstall office, then run regedit and delete any Office related registry entries that still lingered. After that was done I did a fresh install and all was good. Hope that helps someone.

I also ran into this problem today. The problem was that i had tried to install an old version of RadLinker (software for ATI cards) and it obviously had some issues with its msi package. I Installed a newer version of it, which installed properly right away, and it worked!

The application that is causing these errors will be mentioned in the eventlog. To fix go through your eventlog and read the msiinstaller errors and warnings. From there you will identify which application is causing the problem. Uninstall and reinstall to solve the problem.

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