“A Setup Package is either missing or damaged” err

Question

During the installation of Visual Studio 2015 Community on Windows 10 the following error occurred for me:

A Setup Package is either missing or damaged.

Since vcredist_x86.exe and vcredist_x64.exe files correspond to Visual C++ Redistributable Packages for Visual Studio 2013, I provided a location to packages after downloading them (third option on the screenshot). After that the installation went smoothly.

So the question:

are Visual C++ Redistributable Packages for Visual Studio 2013 required for installing of Visual Studio 2015, is there any prerequisites for installing of Visual Studio 2015 on Windows 10, may be i'm missing something obvious?

Answer 1

I may have found the correct walkthrough to get this working.

This is from the page HERE and is not what I came up with myself. Though I did add the VC_redist x86/x64 downloads to the list.

Let me add that I started the update .exe file in run as administrator so you may want to as well.

I got it to work - when it asks you to locate "preparation.exe" or "kb2703187.msp":

1.Open Chrome NOT Internet Explorer - for some @#$*! reason IE doesn't work (at least for me). Though it worked for me in IE11 - Stealthrt

2.Download the file from one (or all) of the links below --> to a "known folder":

preparation.exe --> HERE

kb2703187.msp --> HERE

VC_redist.x64.exe --> HERE

VC_redist.x86.exe --> HERE

Now, go back to the installer and browse to the "known folder" to locate the file you just downloaded

Downloading these files and selecting it in the Please provide a location.. box worked fine for me. I had to reference all 4 files above in order to get it to install.

But I did end up missing some updates:

Answer 2

I was having similar problems and the following solution worked for me:

Run the installer executable with administrator rights (right click on installer exe 'Run as administrator') and proceed with the installation as normal.

Answer 3

This was a problem with Visual Studio's web installer between mid-afternoon PST of Sep 4th through 11:30am on Sep 8th (also PST) which has now been fixed on our end.

Specifically, we were running a clean-up script on past pre-release web-installers for Visual Studio, but the script got too aggressive and deleted vcredist_x86.exe even though the RTM product still needed that particular package. Once we realized the error, we re-published and re-mapped that package so that web installs should now work correctly.

The other workarounds (download the ISO + install vcredist_x86.exe manually) should still be fine answers, but anybody else reading this now shouldn't need to worry about those workarounds.

And last, we're examining our internal policies and procedures to try and avoid this kind of broad mistake in the future.

EricKn, Visual Studio Engineering Manager

Answer 4

I tried most of the items listed with VS 2013, VS 2015 and VS 2017 Community Edition, and all of them failed somewhere during the installation, or failed while installing Data Tools, or the Data Tools did not work correctly (SSIS VSTA Script Editor Not Displaying in VS2015). When I tried with VS 2017 Professional, the installation was seamless for Studio and for Data Tools, with Data Tools functioning correctly at the end.

Answer 5

i apologize up front: this is not going to directly answer the OP's question, but when i searched around for "a setup package is either missing or damaged" while trying to offline-install (from unpacked ISO) VS2105 on my (corporate, internet-starved) build server, there were lots of others with same problem with very little help, and this was the top 1 google hit for that dreaded error message...

here's the deal: i was setting up TFS build agent on corporate server with all kinds of security lock down (including access to internet) from an MSDN subsription VS2015w/U3 ISO (unpacked). ran installer - got the error. after rifling through not-so-helpful SO/MS Connect/etc postings, i was able to glean that the digital signatures on some of the sub-packages were failing validation.

if you know anything about PKIs, read this paragraph if you want, if not skip. there was mention that certain CRLs and CA chains were pushed out via Windows updates/patches. who knows if this server has been patched... it certainly could not do it through automatic win updates. in a nut shell, i needed some way to get those missing items so that the digital signature verification would pass. i thought to myself "why would it work on my local machine, because it is on the same patching schedule as the server (presumably, i don't know for sure)". then it occurred to me that one reason MS offers web installers is just this problem... it then occurred to me that they might have a "best effort" kind of strategy for resolving this kind of thing in their offline installer.

(preface: bear in mind that while this worked in a fairly common corporate set up, they're all different and this might not work for everyone)

what i needed was the ability to run the installer on the server, but somehow get it internet access. so i opened Fiddler, allowed other machines to connect to it, configured the server's internet connection settings >> LAN settings to use my machine as a proxy. first make sure that HTTPS is enabled in Fiddler, then open it up, turn in on, go back to your server (that you configured to proxy via your machines IP address and the port that Fiddler uses; default is 8888) and run the installer. you can actually watch the PKI activity in the request captured by Fiddler, among other http-based traffic). the key of this proxy approach is that the server can get what it need from the web, while all that traffic appears to be coming from your machine, from the network firewall's point of view.

anyhow, i hope this saves someone else the 2 days of pain it caused me.

Answer 6

I was facing the same problem. First I tried the online installation and faced above problem, then I tried to install VS2015 from ISO but it was also giving an error saying "Product version which is higher than what you are trying to install is already installed in the device". I read many post on this but none of them had solved my issue. Finally I went to control panel and uninstalled a Visual studio Updater program. Then offline installation worked for me.