Symptoms

When I try to uninstall FineReader Engine using the Add or Remove programs dialog (Start > Settings > Control Panel > Add or Remove Programs), I get an error message similar to this:

"There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action Launch_deinstall_VisualComponentsX.dll, location: C:\Windows\system32\, command: regsvr32.exe /s /u "C:\Program Files\ABBYY SDK\11\FineReader Engine\Bin\VisualComponentsX.dll". 

Solution

Try to remove the previous version of FREngine completely, as described below:

1. Delete all files from the previous FREngine installation manually.
2. Clean out the registry entries left from the previous FREngine installation:
   1. Create a folder on a hard drive (this folder can be located on any drive and have any name, for example, C:\EngineUninst).
   2. Download the MsiZap utility.
   3. Run the following command from the command line:

FineReader Engine:

• for FRE 10: C:\EngineUninst\MsiZap.exe TW! {AFE10000-0001-0000-0000-074957833700}
• for FRE 11: C:\EngineUninst\MsiZap.exe TW! {AFE11000-0001-0000-0000-074957833700}
• for FRE 12: C:\EngineUninst\MsiZap.exe TW! {AFE12000-0001-0000-0000-074957833700}

FlexiCapture Engine:

• for FCE 10: C:\EngineUninst\MsiZap.exe TW! {FCE10000-0001-0000-0000-074957833700}
• for FCE 11: C:\EngineUninst\MsiZap.exe TW! {FCE11000-0001-0000-0000-074957833700}
• for FCE 12: C:\EngineUninst\MsiZap.exe TW! {FCE12000-0001-0000-9999-074957833700}

Wait until the process is completed. All FineReader Engine keys will be removed from the registry, and the DOS window will close automatically.