Windows Installer has a new installation property called MSIFASTINSTALL. Using the MSIFASTINSTALL property can help reduce the time required to install a windows installer package. The FASTOEM property is designed to enable OEMs to reduce the time to install Windows Installer applications for a specific scenario.
MSIFASTINSTAL reduces the installation time
The trick behind MSIFASTINSTALL is quite simple. It skips things that consume time, like creating a system restore point or calculating the space requirements – File Costing. One should use it only when you are sure that nothing will stop the installation including the storage space requirement.
The value of the MSIFASTINSTALL property can be a combination of the following values. It is available only in Windows Installer 5.0 and later.
So if you do not need system restore points and know that your clients have enough disk space anyway, you could consider using the MSIFASTINSTALL property to speed up application installations.
Use the following commands from an elevated command prompt.
msiexec /i Firefox-3.5-en-US.msi MSIFASTINSTALL=1 /l*v C:\MSTTEST\Install.log /qb
msiexec /i skypesetup.msi MSIFASTINSTALL=1 /l*v C:\MSTTEST\Install.log /qb
More information about the MSIFASTINSTALL property can be found here.
What is FASTOEM property?
There are a lot of advantages to using the FASTOEM property. It’s not just about the time, but it also offers the following features:
- Skip System Restore as it is not needed for the first installs.
- The source files are deleted after the installation.
- You don’t get to see any UI during the installation
- The installation is performed in the per-machine installation context.
- Used for first-time installs
You might also want to take a look at the official documentation of the FASTOEM property to learn more about it.
What is File Costing?
Costing is the process of determining the disk space requirements for an installation. This process includes calculating the amount of disk space needed for the files to be installed or removed, as well as the amount of disk space for any additional files. The disk space includes existing files that are scheduled to be overwritten, as well as registry entries, shortcuts, and other miscellaneous files.
