Cannot Prepare Package for Deployment

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You open a Group Policy object to manage software with the Software Installation snap-in, and browse to the software distribution point and select the package you want to manage. When you click the Open button you receive the following error message:

Cannot prepare the package for deployment. Please check the package for possible corruption.

Possible Causes:

  • The Software Installation snap-in is communicating with the Sysvol share.

  • The package is corrupted.

Diagnostic Tests:

To check to see that the Sysvol can be connected to

  1. Ping the computer with the Sysvol by the computer's IP address to test base-level IP connectivity.

  2. Ping the computer with the Sysvol by server name to test Domain Name System (DNS) name resolution.

  3. Use the net view command to view the computer with the Sysvol by server name to see the available shares. This also confirms if the user has rights to access the share.

To check the package

  1. Install the package on another computer and make sure that the package can be opened.

  2. Install the package by starting the Windows Installer from the command line. C:>msiexec /iPackageName

  3. Test the package to see if it installs on a computer with a similar configuration.