Cannot uninstall or install MS Office XP (or 2003)

[Eric W. Holzapfel]

Hello Office group,

I have a user that has a big problem with MS Office XP (and Office 2003).
The users workstation is XP Pro SP2, Server SBS.
I attempted to deploy Outlook 2003 to the users workstation (from the
server). This failed.

I then attempted to remove office xp from the workstation.
The removal stopped around half-way thru. I also attempted to install
(re-install) office xp, to no avail - it would hang when "copying" the
file "HTML.XLA".

I essentially went thru the same process (foolish i know) with MS Office
2003 from the setup CD running on the workstation - this hung also when
copying the same file!!!! (??)

It appears that the system is locked in limbo between various installs
of office (not counting that the user attempted an office repair before
I tried the two processes noted above.

Any ideas, short of XP Pro reinstall and disk format, to fix this???

thanks,

eric

 

[Peter Foldes]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)

Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?). Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried to remove it? I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to install it and was a no go and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

 

[Peter Foldes]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)

Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?). Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried to remove it? I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to install it and was a no go and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

 

[Peter Foldes]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)

Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?). Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried to remove it? I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to install it and was a no go and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

 

[Peter Foldes]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)

Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?). Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried to remove it? I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to install it and was a no go and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

 

[Peter Foldes]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)

Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?). Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried to remove it? I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to install it and was a no go and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

 

[Peter Foldes]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)

Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?). Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried to remove it? I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to install it and was a no go and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

 

[Peter Foldes]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)

Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?). Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried to remove it? I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to install it and was a no go and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

 

[Peter Foldes]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)

Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?). Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried to remove it? I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to install it and was a no go and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

 

[Bernie Niblets]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)>
Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?).

Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried
to remove it?
Office XP was installed and running on the PC before any
uninstall/installs were attempted.
I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to
install it and was a no go
and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

Hello Peter et al,

The server is running Small Business Server 2003 (with exchange 2003).
The sever can (sometimes, it seems) deploy Outlook 2003 to a client
computer. I tried this, using the ConnectComputer feature, etc and the
install aborted. I did not try to remove any software on the client PC
at the time I tried to "deploy" Outlook 2003 to the client.

the user is/was uing Office XP Pro 2002. I also noticed that someone
had previously installed Office 2000 on this same workstation.
For what it is worth, I checked the date on the Office XP setup.exe, it
is 2001.

The user was running Office XP Pro and using the version of Outlook that
comes with Office XP. This was connected to their exchange server, he
could send and receive email.

the user then had a problem opening an email on his machine, this locked
his system, requiring a forced (i.e. unplug computer) reboot. He then
tried to "repair" Office XP using the repair feature of Office XP - no
luck.

This is when we decided to uninstall Office XP and install Office 2003.
The user does have admin privileges. the uninstall was tried as
"Administrator" and as the user. The uninstall failed in for both
users. The same for the install (probably not a good idea to try an
install on this system, and it failed).

That is about the story here.

Hopefully this will give some useful information (other than some
stupidity, etc!)

Thanks,

eric

 

[Bernie Niblets]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)>
Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?).

Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried
to remove it?
Office XP was installed and running on the PC before any
uninstall/installs were attempted.
I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to
install it and was a no go
and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

Hello Peter et al,

The server is running Small Business Server 2003 (with exchange 2003).
The sever can (sometimes, it seems) deploy Outlook 2003 to a client
computer. I tried this, using the ConnectComputer feature, etc and the
install aborted. I did not try to remove any software on the client PC
at the time I tried to "deploy" Outlook 2003 to the client.

the user is/was uing Office XP Pro 2002. I also noticed that someone
had previously installed Office 2000 on this same workstation.
For what it is worth, I checked the date on the Office XP setup.exe, it
is 2001.

The user was running Office XP Pro and using the version of Outlook that
comes with Office XP. This was connected to their exchange server, he
could send and receive email.

the user then had a problem opening an email on his machine, this locked
his system, requiring a forced (i.e. unplug computer) reboot. He then
tried to "repair" Office XP using the repair feature of Office XP - no
luck.

This is when we decided to uninstall Office XP and install Office 2003.
The user does have admin privileges. the uninstall was tried as
"Administrator" and as the user. The uninstall failed in for both
users. The same for the install (probably not a good idea to try an
install on this system, and it failed).

That is about the story here.

Hopefully this will give some useful information (other than some
stupidity, etc!)

Thanks,

eric

 

[Bernie Niblets]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)>
Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?).

Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried
to remove it?
Office XP was installed and running on the PC before any
uninstall/installs were attempted.
I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to
install it and was a no go
and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

Hello Peter et al,

The server is running Small Business Server 2003 (with exchange 2003).
The sever can (sometimes, it seems) deploy Outlook 2003 to a client
computer. I tried this, using the ConnectComputer feature, etc and the
install aborted. I did not try to remove any software on the client PC
at the time I tried to "deploy" Outlook 2003 to the client.

the user is/was uing Office XP Pro 2002. I also noticed that someone
had previously installed Office 2000 on this same workstation.
For what it is worth, I checked the date on the Office XP setup.exe, it
is 2001.

The user was running Office XP Pro and using the version of Outlook that
comes with Office XP. This was connected to their exchange server, he
could send and receive email.

the user then had a problem opening an email on his machine, this locked
his system, requiring a forced (i.e. unplug computer) reboot. He then
tried to "repair" Office XP using the repair feature of Office XP - no
luck.

This is when we decided to uninstall Office XP and install Office 2003.
The user does have admin privileges. the uninstall was tried as
"Administrator" and as the user. The uninstall failed in for both
users. The same for the install (probably not a good idea to try an
install on this system, and it failed).

That is about the story here.

Hopefully this will give some useful information (other than some
stupidity, etc!)

Thanks,

eric

 

[Bernie Niblets]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)>
Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?).

Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried
to remove it?
Office XP was installed and running on the PC before any
uninstall/installs were attempted.
I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to
install it and was a no go
and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

Hello Peter et al,

The server is running Small Business Server 2003 (with exchange 2003).
The sever can (sometimes, it seems) deploy Outlook 2003 to a client
computer. I tried this, using the ConnectComputer feature, etc and the
install aborted. I did not try to remove any software on the client PC
at the time I tried to "deploy" Outlook 2003 to the client.

the user is/was uing Office XP Pro 2002. I also noticed that someone
had previously installed Office 2000 on this same workstation.
For what it is worth, I checked the date on the Office XP setup.exe, it
is 2001.

The user was running Office XP Pro and using the version of Outlook that
comes with Office XP. This was connected to their exchange server, he
could send and receive email.

the user then had a problem opening an email on his machine, this locked
his system, requiring a forced (i.e. unplug computer) reboot. He then
tried to "repair" Office XP using the repair feature of Office XP - no
luck.

This is when we decided to uninstall Office XP and install Office 2003.
The user does have admin privileges. the uninstall was tried as
"Administrator" and as the user. The uninstall failed in for both
users. The same for the install (probably not a good idea to try an
install on this system, and it failed).

That is about the story here.

Hopefully this will give some useful information (other than some
stupidity, etc!)

Thanks,

eric

 

[Bernie Niblets]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)>
Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?).

Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried
to remove it?
Office XP was installed and running on the PC before any
uninstall/installs were attempted.
I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to
install it and was a no go
and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

Hello Peter et al,

The server is running Small Business Server 2003 (with exchange 2003).
The sever can (sometimes, it seems) deploy Outlook 2003 to a client
computer. I tried this, using the ConnectComputer feature, etc and the
install aborted. I did not try to remove any software on the client PC
at the time I tried to "deploy" Outlook 2003 to the client.

the user is/was uing Office XP Pro 2002. I also noticed that someone
had previously installed Office 2000 on this same workstation.
For what it is worth, I checked the date on the Office XP setup.exe, it
is 2001.

The user was running Office XP Pro and using the version of Outlook that
comes with Office XP. This was connected to their exchange server, he
could send and receive email.

the user then had a problem opening an email on his machine, this locked
his system, requiring a forced (i.e. unplug computer) reboot. He then
tried to "repair" Office XP using the repair feature of Office XP - no
luck.

This is when we decided to uninstall Office XP and install Office 2003.
The user does have admin privileges. the uninstall was tried as
"Administrator" and as the user. The uninstall failed in for both
users. The same for the install (probably not a good idea to try an
install on this system, and it failed).

That is about the story here.

Hopefully this will give some useful information (other than some
stupidity, etc!)

Thanks,

eric

 

[Bernie Niblets]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)>
Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?).

Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried
to remove it?
Office XP was installed and running on the PC before any
uninstall/installs were attempted.
I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to
install it and was a no go
and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

Hello Peter et al,

The server is running Small Business Server 2003 (with exchange 2003).
The sever can (sometimes, it seems) deploy Outlook 2003 to a client
computer. I tried this, using the ConnectComputer feature, etc and the
install aborted. I did not try to remove any software on the client PC
at the time I tried to "deploy" Outlook 2003 to the client.

the user is/was uing Office XP Pro 2002. I also noticed that someone
had previously installed Office 2000 on this same workstation.
For what it is worth, I checked the date on the Office XP setup.exe, it
is 2001.

The user was running Office XP Pro and using the version of Outlook that
comes with Office XP. This was connected to their exchange server, he
could send and receive email.

the user then had a problem opening an email on his machine, this locked
his system, requiring a forced (i.e. unplug computer) reboot. He then
tried to "repair" Office XP using the repair feature of Office XP - no
luck.

This is when we decided to uninstall Office XP and install Office 2003.
The user does have admin privileges. the uninstall was tried as
"Administrator" and as the user. The uninstall failed in for both
users. The same for the install (probably not a good idea to try an
install on this system, and it failed).

That is about the story here.

Hopefully this will give some useful information (other than some
stupidity, etc!)

Thanks,

eric

 

[Bernie Niblets]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)>
Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?).

Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried
to remove it?
Office XP was installed and running on the PC before any
uninstall/installs were attempted.
I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to
install it and was a no go
and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

Hello Peter et al,

The server is running Small Business Server 2003 (with exchange 2003).
The sever can (sometimes, it seems) deploy Outlook 2003 to a client
computer. I tried this, using the ConnectComputer feature, etc and the
install aborted. I did not try to remove any software on the client PC
at the time I tried to "deploy" Outlook 2003 to the client.

the user is/was uing Office XP Pro 2002. I also noticed that someone
had previously installed Office 2000 on this same workstation.
For what it is worth, I checked the date on the Office XP setup.exe, it
is 2001.

The user was running Office XP Pro and using the version of Outlook that
comes with Office XP. This was connected to their exchange server, he
could send and receive email.

the user then had a problem opening an email on his machine, this locked
his system, requiring a forced (i.e. unplug computer) reboot. He then
tried to "repair" Office XP using the repair feature of Office XP - no
luck.

This is when we decided to uninstall Office XP and install Office 2003.
The user does have admin privileges. the uninstall was tried as
"Administrator" and as the user. The uninstall failed in for both
users. The same for the install (probably not a good idea to try an
install on this system, and it failed).

That is about the story here.

Hopefully this will give some useful information (other than some
stupidity, etc!)

Thanks,

eric

 

[Bernie Niblets]

Eric

We need a little bit of clarification here. Something does not make sense.
You say the user is running XP Pro SP with SBS Server(which flavor? of SBS)>
Then you say you tried to remove Office XP(Which flavor of Off XP?).

Also Was Office XP already a resident on the system and you then tried
to remove it?
Office XP was installed and running on the PC before any
uninstall/installs were attempted.
I cannot follow the latter as if it was installed or you tried to
install it and was a no go
and then you tried to uninstall it. Off 2003 same story?

Please clarify.

Hello Peter et al,

The server is running Small Business Server 2003 (with exchange 2003).
The sever can (sometimes, it seems) deploy Outlook 2003 to a client
computer. I tried this, using the ConnectComputer feature, etc and the
install aborted. I did not try to remove any software on the client PC
at the time I tried to "deploy" Outlook 2003 to the client.

the user is/was uing Office XP Pro 2002. I also noticed that someone
had previously installed Office 2000 on this same workstation.
For what it is worth, I checked the date on the Office XP setup.exe, it
is 2001.

The user was running Office XP Pro and using the version of Outlook that
comes with Office XP. This was connected to their exchange server, he
could send and receive email.

the user then had a problem opening an email on his machine, this locked
his system, requiring a forced (i.e. unplug computer) reboot. He then
tried to "repair" Office XP using the repair feature of Office XP - no
luck.

This is when we decided to uninstall Office XP and install Office 2003.
The user does have admin privileges. the uninstall was tried as
"Administrator" and as the user. The uninstall failed in for both
users. The same for the install (probably not a good idea to try an
install on this system, and it failed).

That is about the story here.

Hopefully this will give some useful information (other than some
stupidity, etc!)

Thanks,

eric