Windows installer has a logging service which can give a lot of detail about what is going on “under the hood” when an installation fails. To enable the logging function, create the following registry path and keys:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Installer Reg_SZ:
Logging The value of the field defines the different logging mode’s. You can place multiple letters in the field (or all).
v - Verbose output o - Out-of-disk-space messages i - Status messages c - Initial UI parameters e - All error messages w - Non-fatal warnings a - Start up of actions r - Action-specific records m - Out-of-memory or fatal exit information u - User requests p - Terminal properties + - Append to existing file ! - Flush each line to the log
The generated log files are placed in your system’s TEMP directory. (%TEMP%)