Windows 10: Duplicate cached installers when MSI tries to install to the System folder

We have observed an issue on Windows 11 and Windows Server 2025 machines. In certain, reproducible instances, our .MSI installers will produce a second, untracked cached copy of the installer in the C:\Windows\Installers folder. On uninstall, this second copy sticks around, leading to test machines running out of storage space because the .MSIs are never removed. This happens when an .MSI attempts to install files to the System folder [C:\windows\SysWOW64] and the file already exists with a greater-than-or-equal version [as tracked by Windows installer]. We first noticed this with the VC++ Re

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Windows Installer Error: This installation package cannot be opened.

Hi AJ,

Thank you for posting in Community.

We are glad to provide the assistance required to help you answer your query.

The above error can occur if the locally cached Windows Installer package (*.msi) file is damaged or corrupted.

To rectify the above, I suggest that you try the steps mentioned below and check if you are able to install the software successfully.

• Open the \Windows\Installer folder on your computer's hard disk.
• Right-click any file with an .msi extension.
• Click Properties on the shortcut menu. The
  Subject box on the Summary tab contains the name of the product that installed the .msi file.
• Repeat steps 2 and 3 for each .msi file in the \Installer folder, and delete the .msi file for the software that you are trying to install.

Hope this helps

 

MSI installation with Folder Redirection fails.

We have an issue with some msi-installers (Firefox, Google Chat) running on a system with Folder Redirection enabled. We set UNC path to Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User
Shell Folders\AppData variable. Installation fails with error "Failed to Create AppData Cache Folder".

We found that these installers work fine with Windows Installer V 5.0.17763.404 and fail with Windows Installer. V 5.0.19041.1. We found out that new version of Windows Installer tries to set special permission
on the folder ...\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Installer. It seems that it has troubles to access remote ...\Microsoft\Installer directory in general.

As stated here https://stackoverflow.com/questions/61387044/msi-error-failed-to-create-appdata-cache-folder the
issue could be fixed in Windows 10 1809 by uninstalling April's cumulative update KB4549949 but unfortunately recent versions of Windows 10 have the problem out of the box.

We run installer with /l*vx options and receive log with error "Failed to Create AppData Cache Folder".

 

Duplicate Public Folders

Hi,

To further identify the cause of this problem, can you provide us the following information?

• What happens when you delete the duplicate folders?
• Does it happen to all of your folders or only those with pictures?
• Any steps you've tried to troubleshoot this issue?

Regards.