PRB: Setup Error 168 : Setup Encountered Error Updating Registry

• Microsoft Visual Studio 97
• Microsoft Developer Network Subscriptions
• Microsoft Visual Basic Standard, Professional, and Enterprise Editions, 32-bit only, for Windows, version 5.0
• Microsoft Visual InterDev, version 1.0

SYMPTOMS

The following error might occur during MSDN installation if the registry key that you are trying to modify is locked up or used by other applications or it has reached its limit:

Setup error 168: Setup encountered an error updating your registry.

RESOLUTION

WARNING: Using Registry Editor incorrectly can cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that problems resulting from the incorrect use of Registry Editor can be solved. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.

For information about how to edit the registry, view the "Changing Keys And Values" Help topic in Registry Editor (Regedit.exe) or the "Add and Delete Information in the Registry" and "Edit Registry Data" Help topics in Regedt32.exe. Note that you should back up the registry before you edit it. If you are running Windows NT, you should also update your Emergency Repair Disk (ERD).

Try one or all of the following resolution methods:

1. Use ShrDll to evaluate the size of the SharedDLLs registry key and to clean up unused entries.



2. Versions of MSDN prior to MSDN October 1998 or Visual Studio 6.0 wrote the following keys to the registry:
   

   
   HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\InfoViewer\5.0
         HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\ InfoViewer\5.0 

   
   Delete these keys. To do so, use the Registry Editor: first, go to the Start menu, click Run, type regedit, and click OK to start the Registry Editor. Then, select and delete the two keys. Next, close all applications and try installing MSDN again.



3. Download RegClean.exe from the Microsoft Software Library and run it to clean the HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT section of the registry. Try step 2 again. For additional information, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

   Q147769 INFO: RegClean 4.1a Description and General Issues




4. Open the Registry Editor. Open the following registry key:

   
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SharedDLLs 




1. Save this key by selecting it and choosing Export Registry File from the Registry menu.



2. Save the file with a name (for example, SaveKey1) in a temporary directory (for example, C:\Temp). In this example, a file named SaveKey1.dat is created.



3. Now, delete the key. Try step 1 again. After a successful install, save this key again with a new name (for example, SaveKey2).



4. Import the saved registry file by selecting Import Registry File from the Registry menu and importing the saved file C:\Temp\SaveKey1.dat. By doing this, you combine the old information and any new information created for that key.



5. Import the saved file even if the error does not appear so that you restore the original key. If installation was successful, import the saved registry file (SaveKey2.dat in this example) in case importing SaveKey1.dat over wrote some key values.



6. If the previous method does not resolve the problem, check the SharedDLLs key entries and see if any junk files with extensions such as .c, .cpp, .rc, and so forth are registered. Note that this key is to be used for registering only DLL files.



7. Delete the junk file entries from the SharedDLLs registry key and try to install MSDN again. If this does not work, then you may have to uninstall some applications from your computer to make room in the registry file.



5. Check to see if the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base is applicable:




Q163277 OFF97: Setup Error 168 or "Tahoma Font Is Not Present" Error

6. Run the MSDN setup from a DOS command line as follows for MSDN prior to October 1998:

   
   setup.exe /gerrorlog.txt 

   For versions of MSDN October 1998 and later, run:

   
   setup.exe /gc c:\errorlog.txt 

   The Errorlog.txt file contains the information recorded when setup failed. Use that information to find the registry key that caused the failure and apply step 3 accordingly. The error log file may provide you with valuable information for trouble shooting this problem.

STATUS

This problem was partially addressed in Visual Studio 6.0 and related 6.0 products, where Setup.exe checks the available space in the registry near the beginning of setup. If it looks like there might not be enough registry space to install the software, setup will warn you and point you to a Readme file that contains suggestions on how to handle the situation.

REFERENCES

For additional information, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q147769 INFO: RegClean 4.1a Description and General Issues

Q217165 FILE: ShareDLL.exe File Checks the Size of the SharedDLLs Registry File

Q201546 PRB: Setup - 64K Register Key Limitation Under Windows 95

Additional query words:

Keywords          : kbsetup kbVS97 kbVS600fix 
Version           : WINDOWS:1.0,5.0,97; winnt:
Platform          : WINDOWS winnt 
Issue type        : kbprb 

Last Reviewed: August 5, 1999