Wix installer: installed service unable to read HKLM registry entries on start

Question

I\'m using wix tool 3.11 to create a msi which install a service. The installer runs a Custom Action and returns vars to wix to write to registry (HKLM). The service starts and

Answer 1

Solution: The problem in this case was that the registry keys were not found in the expected location in the registry due to 32-bit / 64-bit issues.

• 64-bit section: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Company\App - MyValue
• 32 bit section: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Company\App - MyValue

End of answer. Leaving debugging efforts in place below though:

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Round 1:

Maybe try to read these two recent answers and check if anything rings a bell:

• Wix Service Installer sometimes fails to install or start
• Wix - ServiceControl start takes four minutes to fail, should be 30 sec

What does it say in the event viewer? (Windows + R eventvwr and OK)

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Round 2:

• Bitness: Are you sure you are reading from the right location in the registry? Are you installing a 32-bit MSI or a 64-bit MSI? (looks like 32-bit)
  • 64-bit section: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Company\App
  • 32 bit section: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Company\App
• Permissions: Did you check the permissions for the registry keys and values your setup writes using regedit.exe to inspect? Right click => Permissions (have to ask).
• Privileges: What account do you use to run the service? It sort of looks like standard LocalSystem? The account needs the SeServiceLogonRight privilege. See second line on section above for details.
• Logging: Do you use log4net or some other logging feature in your service? Did you try the verbose, debug MSI logging found in the first link in the top section?