I Am Literally in Acrobat Hell. Please help!

Report · Mar 22, 2017

I have Adobe Acrobat 7.0 Professional installed at work. For some reason about three months ago I suddenly started getting prompted to install Adobe Acrobat 7.0 Professional (even though it it already installed) EVERY TIME I START UP the computer. I try to let it run through the install process but it says it cannot find the file AcroPro.msi. The filepath given in the prompt does not exist.

Searching the Google I see that MANY people have had this problem but I have yet to see any actual solutions for the problem. Yes, I looked in the C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Acrobat 7.0\Acrobat folder. There's no AcroPro.msi file there. Yes I tried running a cleanup utility. Did not help.

So I decided I would just delete Acrobat and eventually get a newer version. Guess what? I can't even delete the damn thing using Add / Delete Programs because even THEN it is asking me to find AcroPro.msi.

I am running Windows 7. No, I no longer have the installation disk. When my company moved from Manhattan to Westchester the disk got lost in the shuffle.

YES, I tried downloading the Acrobat Pro 7.0 22020134.exe file from helpx.adobe.com and running it again (I do still have my registration number) but it won't let me do THAT without the aforementioned non-existent AcroPro.msi.

I have scoured all of Adobe's web site and Forums in the hopes that SOMEWHERE they would have a download of AcroPro.msi but alas there just seems to be endless troubleshooting suggestions with no solutions and it seems that AcroPro.msi doesn't exist anywhere to help with this problem.

I'm very close to wiping my entire hard drive just to get rid of this problem but I am hoping SOMEONE will have a fix for this that won't involve such drastic measures. HELP!!!!

Thanks,

Pete

Report · Mar 22, 2017

I am told Acrobat 7 doesn't run on Windows 7, it was meant for XP. You do need to upgrade.

Report · Mar 22, 2017

Try this-

go to ftp://ftp.adobe.com/pub/adobe/acrobat/win/7x/7.0/misc/

download and run

01/12/2005 12:00AM 121,558,528 AcTR7EFG.exe

I would expect that Windows Installer will run Repair for your installed Acrobat using newly extracted installer package.

This should be the case if extracted package matches what you have installed.

If not, you have to search for better source, but keep in mind that you need full base 7.0 installer (Exe size should be more than 100MB)

Report · Mar 23, 2017

Leo - thanks for the info...I tried installing the AcTR7EFG.exe but installer stops after you choose language and hit Next. The popup I get says "Setup has detected that you already have a more functional product installed. Setup will now terminate". So that's about as far as I can go. It seems that without the elusive AcroPro.msi file I am stuck. Can't fix the thing (I tried clicking the "Detect and Repair" option in Acrobat but nothing happens) and I can't uninstall it. Meh. 😕

Report · Mar 23, 2017

msi files describe what you install, and they are the list of what to uninstall. So if it gets deleted you often can never uninstall, never repair, never recover. They are pretty big do dkmetimes people delete them to save space. Worst of all, sometimes sellers pre install software without msi files, leaving their customers stranded. You might find it on the original install CD. The current download is DIFFERENT so it can't substitute.

Current and recent versions of Acrobat have a cleanup tool that can do this magic, but they don't go back to 7, I think.

Report · Mar 23, 2017

Yes, I'm realizing that I'm going to have to rip the office apart and find that original installation disk to make this go away. I never deleted anything from the computer so it must have either auto-deleted AcroPro.msi after install or it installed from the disk itself without copying over (fun). I just think it's bizarre that Acrobat ran fine for about three years with no problems then all of a sudden one day it starts prompting me to install it when I boot up in the morning.

Since the program itself is working fine, I'm thinking I might just try and figure out a way to get it to STOP asking when I boot up. I'm sure there must be something in the startup process I can turn off that will stop that (one can dream)! I just wanted to make sure the installation itself was fine but after three weeks of this I've had enough!

Any other suggestions welcome...thanks all!

Report · Mar 23, 2017

I also think it's kind of bizarre that a Google search comes up with pages of people having the same or similar problems but there seems to be no fix short of pulling your hair out or doing what I've been doing to fix it (and no clear solutions from Adobe, either). Oh well. Que Sera Sera. Cherchez la femme, as Dr. Buzzard once said.

Report · Mar 23, 2017

I still think I can help you.

Did you try to search for AcroPro.msi on your hard drive? If not, try it first. If found, provide it's location to the installer when asked.

If you can't find it at all, do this:

1. enable MSI verbose logging (google for how to do it)

2. next time you see installer asking for AcroPro.msi, go to your User Temp folder, find latest file with the name MSIxxxx.log, open it and search for word ProductCode. It should have value similar to {AC76BA86-1033-F400-8796-100000000002}

Provide it and I will try to find your exact source.

Report · Mar 23, 2017

Well, as I said Adobe acknowledged the problem and created a repair tool. Too late for you though.

Report · Mar 23, 2017

One would think they would have a repair tool for older versions...or a place to actually download the elusive AcroPro.msi file but what can ya do. If it was raining soup I'd be the only guy in the street with a fork.

Report · Mar 23, 2017

Adobe does supply a replacement Acrobat 7 Pro with its own serial number free of charge to A7 owners due to the take down of the activation servers.

Download from here Download Adobe Acrobat 7 and Adobe Creative Suite 2 products

and use the serial number to the right of the download, not your original. It may work. I suggest right-clicking on installer and choosing "Run as Administrator."

I've been discouraged by the admins in this group from suggesting it because of XP/7 issues, but mmight as well try.

Report · Mar 23, 2017

Thanks Gener7 - that's part of the crazy thing with this - I tried doing just that (reinstalling from the page you linked to) but it won't even reinstall. After I choose "English" as my preferred language and hit "Next" I get the same popup saying it cannot install because it cannot locate the AcroPro.msi file (which makes no sense to me as one would think it should be included in the .exe).

LeoAdobeX - I will give that a try, likely next week when I can afford some PC downtime. I'm relatively adept at all thing computer but that process seems like it requires some intricate steps that I'll need to pay close attention to. I'm usually just smart enough to screw things up when it comes to things like that.

Thanks all!

Pete