Is there way to detect install location without uninstall registry nor C:\Windows\Installer?

Question

Some of the executable that I need to detect is installed properly, but has not written InstallLocation in the usual Computer\\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\

Answer 1

MSI API: Here is a sample using VBScript to get the installation path for Microsoft Visual C++ 2012 x86 Minimum Runtime - 11.0.50727 - update GUIDs for your purpose (obviously):

Set i = CreateObject("WindowsInstaller.Installer")

' Microsoft Visual C++ 2012 x86 Minimum Runtime - 11.0.50727
MsgBox i.ComponentPath("{2F73A7B2-E50E-39A6-9ABC-EF89E4C62E36}","{F5CBD6DC-5C9C-430E-83A7-179BA49988CD}")

Installer.ComponentPath method:

• The first parameter is the product code.
• The second parameter is the component code.

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GUIDs: Open the MSI in question with Orca (or equivalent, see link) to find the Product code in the "Property Table" and the Component code in the "Component Table".

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For installed packages you can do as follows:

• ProductCode: How can I find the product GUID of an installed MSI setup?
• Open Cached MSI: You can find the cached MSI and do a File => Open in Orca to retrieve the information you need. You can find the cached path using the script below.

Find Cached MSI: The below PowerShell script is from here. It will allow you to find the local cache path for the installed MSI.

gwmi -Query "SELECT Name,LocalPackage FROM Win32_Product WHERE IdentifyingNumber='{2F73A7B2-E50E-39A6-9ABC-EF89E4C62E36}'" | Format-Table Name,LocalPackage

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Links:

• Show resolved installation directories for MSI