My Dimension 9200 has just been returned following repair by Dell with two new hard drives and a fresh Vista installation. Most of my software has reinstalled without problems, but I am unable to get some items to install. These include Microsoft Autoroute 2004, Adobe Lightroom and Google Earth. The common error theme is:

 

This installation package could not be opened. Verify the package exisits and that you can access it, or contact the application vendor to verify that this is a valid Windows Installer package

 

I have spent a long time talking this through with Adobe support. Although helpful, Adobe say this is a Windows Vista issue. I tried installation before before and since installing Vista SP1.

 

Is it just me or is Vista a bit of a pig? Windows XP was not perfect but I do not recall it giving so many problems.