Can't install several diff programs

[xlodo]

Hi guys. A friend's pc can't install many programs (some game demos from a Creative cd, 3dmark03-01 and some others). He gets an error about the installer being "corrupt and can't be unpacked" and the process finishes, he says he could install Unreal 2 though. I've never seen that before, any ideas? Thanks in advance

 

[kinetic_tw]

Could be the early signs of a failing hard drive or bad IDE cable. If he's having trouble installing things from CD as well, it *could* be a failing motherboard. That's mostly worst-cast scenario though. I'd check for virii and redownload those programs, to start.

 

[xlodo]

Thanks for answering. the thing is that it happens both from cd's and downloaded files. Now here's a strange thing, he dloaded a code creatures demo and th efirst time we got an error upon install, then we launched it again to copy the error, and it installed fine, what can I say. I left memtest86 running on his machine and he'll do a scandisk, hopefully one of those will throw something

 

[pat]

I would check for IDE cable. Maybe loose connection, wrong type of cable (ata66 cable in an ata100/133 interface) or simply bad connector

-Always put the blame on you first, then on the hardware !!!

 

[alejandrolanza]

Post deleted by alejandrolanza

 

[pat]

Yep. He could have a broken connector. That happen when you unplug the cable from the drive. So, anything that has to go by this wire may suffer corruption.

-Always put the blame on you first, then on the hardware !!!