Sql – Access is denied error installing SQL Server 2008 on Windows 7

sqlsql-server-2008windows 7

Attempting to install SQL Server 2008 R2, Standard, Developer Edition, and/or Express on Windows 7 Enterprise, I keep getting 'Access is denied' at the very end of the installation.
Contents of log:

Configuration error code: 0xDC80C325

Configuration error description: Access is denied

I've tried these suggestions with no success :

SQL Server 2008 Access Denied

SQL 2008 install on Windows Server 2008 Permission Denied errors
r-2008-permission-denied-errors

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2000257

Even our system administrator logging in as the local machine administrator is unable to complete the installation or give rights to/change the local debug policy (as suggested in the above links).

Thanks for any information.

Best Answer

Here is a solution for this.

This failure often is caused by a system or domain policy removing the SeDebugPrivelege security privilege from the administrator account running setup. Verify that the account running has this privilege.

The AccessChk tool will print all privleges for an account (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb664922.aspx) by running: accesschk.exe -a \ *

Alternatively, we can check this through your group policy editor as mentioned below:

Open Group Policy... Start | Run | Type: gpedit.msc | OK | Navigate to Computer Configuration\Windows Settings\Security Settings\Local Policies\User Rights Assignment\Debug programs

The account through which we are trying to run the setup should be here ( besides the local admin on that machine). I included that here, restarted the server ( this is mandatory, gpupdate /force will not work) and ran the setup and it was successful this time.

SQL Server 2008 setup needs this privilege to start up the SQL Server process and listen to an event that signals back to setup that SQL Server successfully started.

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