«

Hi
I'm running Win XP home and have a totally pukka (very expensive) Office XP
Professional (version2002) which I bought at the same time as my new
computer (last April 03).

I haven't had any major problems with Office until tonight, when I got an
error message on boot up, and now if I run "Detect and Repair" or even put
the original CD into the CD drive, I can't get past the following message :

"This patch package could not be opened. Verify that the patch package
exists, and that you can access it, or contact the application vendor to
verify that this is a valid Windows Installer patch package."

I've tried to download updates from Windows Office Update site
http://office.microsoft.com/officeup...og.aspx?CTT=98
and got the following error message :

Error! Unable to check for updates on this computer
The Office Update site is unable to check for updates on this computer. This
may be happening because of one of the following reasons:
You do not have administrative privileges for this computer.
There is a network problem and the detection catalog used by the Office
Update site failed to download. Go back to the Downloads home page and try
running detection again.
Windows Installer patch files (.MSP files) from previously applied Office
updates are missing from the \Windows\Installer hidden directory on your
computer. MSP files are stored on your computer after update installation
completes because they need to be referenced for future update operations.
If the files are missing you will not be able to apply Office updates. You
may also be unable to uninstall Office products as a result of the same
problem. Please contact Microsoft Product Support Services for assistance.
You installed Office updates in the past and then upgraded from Windows
Installer version 1.0 to Windows Installer version 1.1. For more information
see the KB article Windows Installer May Prompt for Install Source if
Unavailable.

If you try and contact Product Support as is suggested above you go through
the madness of Microsoft and get nowhere fast.

Does anybody have any suggestions as to how I can correct this? Outlook is
working fine, but I am worried that I can't access the original disc.

Thanks very much
Caaagh

OFF: Error Message: This Patch Package Could Not Be Opened ...
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=295823

Error Message: 1635 This Patch Package Could Not Be Opened
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=812490


On Tue, 29 Jun 2004 22:53:53 +0100, in
<>
Caaagh scrawled:

>Hi
>I'm running Win XP home and have a totally pukka (very expensive) Office XP
>Professional (version2002) which I bought at the same time as my new
>computer (last April 03).
>
>I haven't had any major problems with Office until tonight, when I got an
>error message on boot up, and now if I run "Detect and Repair" or even put
>the original CD into the CD drive, I can't get past the following message :
>
>"This patch package could not be opened. Verify that the patch package
>exists, and that you can access it, or contact the application vendor to
>verify that this is a valid Windows Installer patch package."
>
>I've tried to download updates from Windows Office Update site
>http://office.microsoft.com/officeup...og.aspx?CTT=98
>and got the following error message :
>
>Error! Unable to check for updates on this computer

<snip>

>If you try and contact Product Support as is suggested above you go through
>the madness of Microsoft and get nowhere fast.
>
>Does anybody have any suggestions as to how I can correct this? Outlook is
>working fine, but I am worried that I can't access the original disc.
>
>Thanks very much
>Caaagh
>
>

--
Basic computer maintenance
http://uk.geocities.com/personel44/maintenance.html