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Good day! I use Wix v3.11 to create MSI, and my project uses merge module for VCRedist. After getting the warning that I should "set the Package/@InstallerVersion attribute to 301 or greater to merge this merge module" I noticed that by default WiX sets Package/@InstallerVersion to 200. Why? Modern versions of Windows come with Windows Installer 4.5 and greater (here is the table from MS).

Andrey G.A
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  • Check the wix documentation [here](https://wixtoolset.org/documentation/manual/v3/xsd/wix/package.html) It's explaining why. For your installer you can set `InstallerVersion="301"` – Pavel Anikhouski Jun 10 '19 at 07:56
  • I believe the version is set as low as possible to ensure the MSI can be installed on as many systems as possible - until there is a technical reason not to allow it, which is exactly what you have discovered with that merge module. A higher version is required. I would set the version to what is suggested in that error message. What VCRedist version is this? – Stein Åsmul Jun 10 '19 at 10:43
  • VCRedist ships libraries for VC140 toolset, which corresponds to MSVS 2015. – Andrey G.A Jun 10 '19 at 10:52
  • One trick is to put such merge modules in a separate setup to avoid them being part of your main setup. Helps corporate deployment. Some prefer to [download the run-time on-demand via a Burn bootstrapper](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/42720958/web-download-of-vcruntime140-with-wix-burn) because the run-time they bundle in the setup gets outdated and hence just bloats the download and complicates their setup. – Stein Åsmul Jun 10 '19 at 12:10

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The default is 200 because WiX v3.x still views Windows XP as a viable target operating system. Now, I know Windows XP is a menace to the internet and it is easy to argue that support for Windows XP should be dropped. However, the WiX Toolset doesn't drop platforms easily so 200 remains the baseline for WiX v3.x.

In WiX v4.0 the open question whether the minimum should move to 500, as Windows 7 is the minimum (barely) supported Windows.

Rob Mensching
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  • I've experienced issues trying to install modern software on a fully patched win7. I barely test on it anymore unless asked and don't touch XP period. – Christopher Painter Jun 12 '19 at 18:16