Hi, I keep getting this message all the time when trying to install Exchange 2010 Enterprise onto a 2008 R2 box in a Server 2003 domain. On a previous installation I had not raised the Forest funtional level to 2003 which I have now done. I then attempted the installation once more then noticed that I had mistakenly logged in to the server as the local administrator not the domain admin. Now all I get is this message. I have deleted the ExchangeSetupLogs folder from the root of C: and tried the install again but keep getting the same message. I found in Google some references to a previous version of Exchange that said if there were any file renames pending that had been completed you could delete these from the registry. I have looked and this doesn't seem to be the case. The key mentioned does not even exist. Anyone else seen this message before? Howard

Hi,What is the detail error information?Please try to past the setup log here for futher troubleshooting.Besides, I'd like to know after a unsuccessfully setup,do you try to uninstall from add/remove??Regards,Xiu

Hi Xiu. Nothing was appearing in Add/Remove programs. What I did find after some more Googling was a related issue for Exchange 2007. If you remove the following key: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\SessionManager\PendingFileRenameOperations the installation works. I noticed in that key there were some referenced to printers that were being installed via GPO/Pushprinters. along with a few other things. I never saw this in my virtual environment so this totally threw me. I have seen it on both a Mailbox and CAS/HT server and the fix worked both times. Putting both Exchange servers into an OU with GP blocking stops the printer installs from working but the key still gets recreated with entries supposedly to do with rolling back patch installs but at least the Exchange installation was able to proceed. Howard

Cool. Thanks for your feedback.Regards,Xiu

I want to say I'm having the same problem, but I don't have that registry key. I'm trying to deploy Exchange 2010 on Server 2008 R2. For all the readiness checks, "A reboot from a previous installation is pending. Please restart the system and rerun setup" error is displayed. I'm at my wit's end. There's not much out there when searching for this error. What little I can find references registry keys I don't have. It seems like there definitely is a reg key to blame somewhere, I just have no idea how to find it. Any suggestions where I can look? -Tim

Howard removing the registry key worked like a charm. Thanks!

Removing the key worked for me as well - thanks for the time saver!

Thanks for that one matey, it helped me out nicely after searching for about 2 mins. Now i have Exchange 2010 Installed and running like a beauty.

Worked great for me too. Was installing management tools onto a Backup Exec server and got the pending install please restart message. This was for Exchange Server 2010 SP1 and Backup Exec 2010 R3 on Win2008 64-bit. Rod Hills

Worked for applying SP3 on Exchange Server 2007 at SBS 2008 Calle:-)

Thank you for this very valuable piece of information. You saved my day !

Answers like these are priceless!!! Thanks this saved me a lot of trouble shooting time!

Hi - the exact same thing happened to me trying to install management tools only (Exchange2010 SP1 - onto Windows 2007 R2 server) .. my pending item was a sophos file... so I renamed the aforementioned pendingfilenrename key.. hit retry on the Exchange setup .. it installed .. after everything was working I renamed the key back to what it was... perhaps Sophos will update correctly at some point.Steve Morris MANOTO IT Consultants Ltd

The following worked for me, thanks! If you remove the following key: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\SessionManager\PendingFileRenameOperations

Thanks Howard, This was the exact fix for my issue. I just deleted the entry for that key rather than delete the entire key itself. The less I need to remove from the registry, the better. Matt

Yep, this is still happening. Tried to install Exchange 2010 SP2 and got constant "pending reboot" errors during prerequisite checks. I removed the entries in the key and am now installing the SP. This forum saved us a lot of time. Thanks to Howard and other contributors. It would be great that when Microsoft software finds entries in the registry like this, put the result in the error pop up so we aren't left guessing what is going on. They found the info, publish it. It's not a secret.BruceEppd