Trying to install SQL Server Express 2005 on Windows 7 64bit?

You may see issues especially if you are using one of the lightweight downloads of SSE that is dual x86/x64 packaged for x64 WOW.

If you are seeing an ASP registration error, make sure you have the ASP and IIS features ON in Windows 7 – especially the IIS 6 compatibility pieces of IIS.

Once this is switched on you can execute (excluding the quotes):

“cscript %systemdrive%inetpubAdminScriptsadsutil.vbs set w3svc/AppPools/Enable32bitAppOnWin64 1”

Which should set you right to run SQL Server setup again.

I stumbled on this on a fresh VM of Windows 7 installed today to run a legacy App that uses SQL Server Express 2005 and plucked this line of script out of my SharePoint knowledgebase after 5 minutes of headscratching.

Hope this helps somebody out there.

Enjoy, but remember no warranty expressed or implied and use at your own risk!