Installation Failing on Windows XP PRo

Question

Trying to install 10G Express with no luck. The installation process just stops and no further messages or prompts are given. Installation fails during the Copying files process and the last message in the dialog box is "Producing Product Information". Here is a snippet from the OracleDatabaseExpressInstall.log
Property(S): OriginalDatabase = C:\WINDOWS\Downloaded Installations\{853C63CA-5594-4874-AAE3-C9B8A0975391}\Oracle Database 10g Express Edition.msi
Property(S): UILevel = 2
Property(S): Preselected = 1
Property(S): ACTION = INSTALL
Property(S): ISStartupEvent = E295978
Property(S): ff9ef67406aa11d5ab9800b0d02332eb = g
Property(S): CLEANUPUNINSTALLROLLBACK = Waiting
Property(S): CostingComplete = 1
Property(S): OutOfDiskSpace = 0
Property(S): OutOfNoRbDiskSpace = 0
Property(S): PrimaryVolumeSpaceAvailable = 0
Property(S): PrimaryVolumeSpaceRequired = 0
Property(S): PrimaryVolumeSpaceRemaining = 0
Property(S): SOURCEDIR = C:\WINDOWS\Downloaded Installations\{853C63CA-5594-4874-AAE3-C9B8A0975391}\
Property(S): SourcedirProduct = {F0BC0F9E-C4A8-485C-93ED-424DB9EA3F75}
Property(S): ProductToBeRegistered = 1
MSI (s) (50:38) [12:31:31:265]: Note: 1: 1708
MSI (s) (50:38) [12:31:31:265]: Product: Oracle Database 10g Express Edition -- Installation operation failed.
MSI (s) (50:38) [12:31:31:265]: Attempting to delete file C:\WINDOWS\Installer\2b7f2ce.mst
MSI (s) (50:38) [12:31:31:265]: Unable to delete the file. LastError = 32
MSI (s) (50:38) [12:31:31:296]: Cleaning up uninstalled install packages, if any exist
MSI (s) (50:38) [12:31:31:296]: MainEngineThread is returning 1602
MSI (s) (50:C4) [12:31:31:296]: Destroying RemoteAPI object.
MSI (s) (50:10) [12:31:31:296]: Custom Action Manager thread ending.
=== Logging stopped: 11/5/2005 12:31:31 ===
MSI (c) (D0:78) [12:31:31:328]: Decrementing counter to disable shutdown. If counter >= 0, shutdown will be denied. Counter after decrement: -1
MSI (c) (D0:78) [12:31:31:328]: MainEngineThread is returning 1602
=== Verbose logging stopped: 11/5/2005 12:31:31 ===

Answer 1

There are a few well known installation issues - in order of likelihood
1) Check that the Windows username you have logged on with does not contain a space (or other special characters such as umlauts etc). The workaround is to create another Windows account without spaces, give that account Administrator privileges, and install using that account.
2) Certain locales have problems. These include Russian, Estonian, English - South Africa, Spanish - Dominican Republic, German - Switzerland, French - Switzerland, Italian - Switzerland. The work around is to set the user locale to something else before the XE installation.
3) If you have the DLL oraociei10.dll in your path you will have problems. Workaround is: Search to see if this file exists on your hard drive. If it does, check to see that the directory that contains it is not in your path. If it is in your path, then remove during the Install. You can add it back to your path after the install, but the SQL Command line provides with Oracle Database XE will not work
In all cases above, deinstall the software using Add/Remove Progam before trying the work around