Huge delay on "Preparing to Install" wizard page

[Aleksandar Puskas]

My installer has a tendency to experience a ~30 second delay on Preparing to Install wizard page. It happens in 50% of tests and I have even received reports that the number goes up to 100%.

When debugging the setup I can see a line similar to the below around the time of delay:

[07:47:44.590]   Found 787 files to register with RestartManager.

It appears as if InnoSetup is running a "file in use check" in this phase. At this point in time, if this is an upgrade, most of the files will be in use anyway. So I found CloseApplications and set it to no to no avail. I still see the same delay but no "Found XYZ files" message anymore.

In the "PrepareToInstall" function I uninstall the previous version automatically (if any) but the "in use check" occurs prior to this.

The noticeable delay seems to coincide with the moment when my setup started deploying a much larger number of files. Is there a way to turn off this behavior? The ~30 second delay without any sensible message is apparently too long.

BTW, I am using the latest InnoSetup 6.2.1. I have also turned off Windows Defender real-time protection during my tests just to make sure this is not affecting the results.

[Aleksandar Puskas]

Please disregard. This was all my fault!

[Gavin Lambert]

On 9/05/2022 23:47, Aleksandar Puskas wrote:
> Please disregard. This was all my fault!

It's helpful in cases like this to explain what the problem actually
was, for the benefit of other readers who might encounter similar issues
in the future.

[Aleksandar Puskas]

Sorry, you are right.

In my PrepareToInstall I make sure the previous app version gets uninstalled. Sadly due to a recently introduced bug the Windows service failed to stop gracefully before Windows terminated it forcefully. Apparently the time it takes before Windows kills the service is 1 minute. This is exactly the delay I was seeing in Preparing to Install wizard page and it had nothing to do with Inno Setup or Restart Manager.

Hope it helps someone.