Weird CF 8 installation issue on Parallels 3.0

by kai on 19/08/2007



I’ve tried to install CF 8 in my Parallels Win XP SP 2 Virtual Machine the other night. What happened was basically that the installer (InstallAnywhere) extracted all the files and also launched the actual installation wizard – but the windows of the installation window didn’t render – it appeared to be just empty.

Interesting enough – it wasn’t empty – it basically turned out that all the content and buttons etc. were there – with a bit of guessing about their positions I was able to quit it again.

Even worse – the same happened when I tried to install Reportbuilder or the .NET Services for CF 8. So – it must have been some issue with the installer itself.

It took me a while to figure out that this issue was related to Parallels video adapter settings. The final clue I needed was a post in the Aptana forum on some installation issues – and apparently Aptana uses InstallAnywhere as well.

The solution was to go into the Display Properties of the Parallels Windows XP, Settings tab, Advanced button. In the then appearing popup window, select the Troubleshoot tab and move Hardware acceleration to “None” and switch off “Enable write combining”.

After that – all InstallAnywhere-based software installed fine and having finished the installations you could easily revert your display settings. Sounds weird? I agree, but at least it solved my issue.

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