So I have a machine with a corporate image and was not included in local admins, so could not initially load Workstation 10. I logged in with an admin account and added myself to the local admins group, but then as I usually do, I thought I'd me smart, and went in and took ownership and or added my previously non-admin account to C:\Users\...
When I tried to upgrade to Workstation 11, I kept getting the MSI error. Checked all of the posts, the only way I could get around it, was by logging in with the original admin account I had installed VMW 10 with, and upgrading. I ignored the MSI errors that kept popping up. It worked.
The problem is every time I start up a VM it wants to install tools. It downloads them, then fails saying it could not install them. Checked forums, didn't like any of the answers, the most basic of which was to re-install Windows.
I went to Microsoft and looked for MSI errors, and found a FixIt tool called "Fix problems that programs cannot be installed or uninstalled".
I ran this tool, and selected "Detect problems and let me select the fixes to apply". After thinking for a while, it asked me if the issue was installing or uninstalling; I selected Uninstalling. After thinking for a while it came up with a list of programs including tools-freebsd, tools-netware, tools-solaris, tools-windows and tools-pre-winpre2k. I had to run the tool for each program one at a time, but I selected each one, and in the next screen selected "Yes, try uninstall".
This process fixed the issues. Hope it can help someone else.
