This was taken from:

http://timjacobs.blogspot.com/2008/06/sql-server-2005-express-edition-on.html

It’s copied here in case his blog ever goes away.  Thanks Tim!

While experimenting with the Microsoft App-V 4.5 Release Candidate (more on that soon), I decided to go for a full-blown installation on Windows 2008 x64. Since this is only on my home network, I don’t run a dedicated SQL server so I went for the natural choice of installing SQL Server 2005 Express Edition SP2 on my freshly installed Windows 2008 x64 App-V server.

This turned out to be less trivial than I thought. The short answer is: if you want to have a painless install of SQL Server 2005 Express Edition, take the download that includes the “Advanced Services” and simply don’t install them. The “smaller” download package does not include some necessary files for a successful x64 installation.

If you want to go the hard way and patch the setup for easier automated deployment (or just to be ‘1337 and be able to say that you fixed Microsoft’s SQL Server installer for 64-bit systems…), then follow these steps:

• First of all, you should know that SP2 is the first Vista/Windows 2008 certified edition (think UAC, think session zero hardening, think enhanced security). Secondly, SQL Server 2005 Express Edition SP2 is supported to run under WOW64. That is very comforting to know, and I hadn’t expected a true 64-bit edition for free. So why does it complain about installing a 32-bit version on a 64-bit machine then?

  
  “The installation package has a missing file, or you are running a 32-bit only Setup program on a 64-bit computer”

  Of course, what you don’t see is that SQL is first installing the SQL Native Client in the background (as a prerequisite) and the error message conveniently forgets to mention that this is in fact the installation that is not succeeding. The error message was indeed accurate, but the error was not that I was trying to run a 32-bit installer on a 64-bit machine, but that the 64-bit installer for the SQL Native Client is not included in the package! What’s even worse, some other essential x64 packages are also not included in the smallest SQL Express 2005 SP2 download.

• So you have to include the missing files manually:
  1. Download the “SQL Server 2005 Express Edition SP2 with Advanced Services” package.
  2. Run both the SQL Express installers with the /X switch to extract the setup files (to different directories):

     sqlexpr.exe /x
     sqlexpr_adv.exe /x
     

  3. Next, locate the 64-bit SQL Native Client (sqlncli_x64.msi) and 64-bit SQL VSS Writer (SqlWriter_x64.msi) from the Advanced Services setup and copy them to the “Setup” directory of the regular SQL Express installation.

I performed the upgrade on a couple other Wordpress installations just to make sure it wouldn’t blow up the sites.  I’m happy to report that it didn’t.

So I’ve upgraded this site as well.  It went very smooth even though I have many plugins installed and activated.  I love the new features and interface.

Highly recommend the upgrade to anyone.

Zachary M. Morvik

Just a quick note to make sure everyone is aware of the Office patches coming out on Tuesday.

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms08-mar.mspx

Zachary M. Morvik

I tried to upgrade Thunderbird this morning and during the installation, I ran into an error with file mozMapi32.dll.

Strangely enough, this turned out that my Logitech Quickcam software had a lock on this file.  Just right click on the Quickcam icon in your system tray and exit the Quickcam software or terminate the process.  Installation of Thunderbird will proceed with no problem.

Zachary M. Morvik

When using SRS, if you set a report to save to a file on a share on a remote machine, you may get logon related errors and impersonation errors.  These are fixed by adding the user who the report is run under to the Allow Log On Locally policy.  Remember to use Domain Controller Security Policy if the server is a Domain Controller.

I won’t even tell you how long it took to figure this out.

-Zachary M. Morvik