There seems to be quite a few people getting an error installing MS SQL 2008 on Windows x64 machines. The error message is
The INSTANCESHAREDWOWDIR command line value is not valid. Please ensure the specified path is valid and different than the INSTANCESHAREDDIR path.
It is a bug with the SQL 2008 installer when installed on windows x64 bit machines. the work around is to specify the path when running the installer by doing it from a command prompt or create a shortcut to the setup.exe on the CD and add the following line next to the setup.exe from the command prompt.
e:\setup.exe /action=install /INSTALLSHAREDDIR=”C:\SQLshared\x64″ /INSTALLSHAREDWOWDIR=”C:\SQLshared\x86″ setup proceeds without issues
Assuming e: is your CD-ROM or where the setup files are located. also here we assume you will be installing it on the C:
If you run into any issues please let us know, this worked for every client we that checked in with us. If it does work for you please still let us know so we know that our tips are useful and we would post more tips as we see them work.
Thank you
ITAhmed