RemoveError: 'setuptools' is a dependency of conda and cannot be removed from conda's operating environment

Question

I have Win 10

When running:

conda update conda

I encountered this error:

RemoveError: \'setuptools\' is a dependenc         


        

Answer 1

While I still did not find how to cleanly uninstall anaconda, I was able to resolve the error by using the following:

conda update --force conda
conda update anaconda

and again

conda update conda

As a result, I got a stable environment with no dependency conflicts. Seems like something within latest conda is too restrictive and update must be forced.