Windows Installer Service ould not be accessed.

[Mantrid]

I've been getting the following error:

The Windows Installer Service could not be accessed. This can occur if you are running Windows in safe mode, or if the Windows Installer is not correctly installed. Contact your support personnel for assistance.

I've tried everything that online guides have told me. I consulted Microsoft's site, wherein I renamed msiexec.exe, msi.dll, msihnd.dll, and ran version 3 of the Windows Installer they pointed me towards. This had no effect. I've tried restarting the services, I've unregistered and reregistered the service, I've verified the registry entry that points to the location of msiexec.exe.

All other guides I've found online are not for Windows XP, and the steps do not translate.

I try running dcomcnfg, and when I click on Component Services, and then the Computers folder, the utility crashes without giving an error.

I'm at wit's end here. I'd really rather fix this myself than do a repair installation.

[codered6651]

I'm assuming you have XPSP2, if yes see if the following will help http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org/how..._windows_i.htm. I'm you tried the one from the MS site but you may have missed a step. Try this and inform us how things turn out it won't hurt to try.