Installing SharePoint 2010 prerequisites offline from a local path using arguments file

The new SharePoint 2010 prerequisites installer installs all the software required to install SharePoint 2010. The default behaviour of this prerequisites installer is to download the files from Internet. However, you can install the prerequisites from a network share.

Today I was looking to install the prerequisites offline from local path. Installing from a local path, like C:\ , is required when you are in a VM.

I copied all the software to a local path in my VM which is C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles. Followed the TechNet article and created the PrerequisiteInstaller.Arguments.txt, used the same format for the arguments as specified in the article:

/SQLNCli: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\sqlncli.msi"/ChartControl: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\MSChart.exe"/W2K8SP2: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Windows6.0-KB948465-X64.exe"/NETFX35SP1: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\dotnetfx35setup.exe"/PowerShell: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Windows6.0-KB968930-x64.msu"/KB976394: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Windows6.0-KB976394-x64.msu"/KB976462: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Windows6.1-KB976462-v2-x64.msu"/IDFX: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Windows6.0-KB974405-x64.msu"/Sync: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Synchronization.msi"/FilterPack: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\FilterPackx64.exe"/ADOMD: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\SQLSERVER2008_ASADOMD10.msi"/ReportingServices: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\rsSharePoint.msi"/Speech: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\SpeechPlatformRuntime.msi"/SpeechLPK: "C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\MSSpeech_SR_en-US_TELE.msi"

As you can see, I have replaced the network share with my local path C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles

Unfortunately, this didn't work for me. After several attempts of reviewing the log file, the following worked:

/SQLNCli:"c:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\sqlncli.msi" /ChartControl:"c:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\MSChart.exe" /NETFX35SP1:"c:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\dotnetfx35setup.exe" /KB976462:"c:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Windows6.1-KB976462-v2-x64.msu" /IDFXR2:"c:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Windows6.1-KB974405-x64.msu" /Sync:"C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\Synchronization.msi" /FilterPack:"C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\FilterPack64bit.exe" /ADOMD:"C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\SQLSERVER2008_ASADOMD10.msi" /ReportingServices:"C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\rsSharePoint.msi" /Speech:"C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\SpeechPlatformRuntime.msi" /SpeechLPK:"C:\SERVER14\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles\MSSpeech_SR_en-US_TELE.msi"

So, what are the differences? - There is no space where highlighted Yellow and a space where highlighted Orange. 

/SQLNCli: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\sqlncli.msi"/ChartControl: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\MSChart.exe"/W2K8SP2: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\Windows6.0-KB948465-X64.exe"/NETFX35SP1: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\dotnetfx35setup.exe"/PowerShell: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\Windows6.0-KB968930-x64.msu"/KB976394: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\Windows6.0-KB976394-x64.msu"/KB976462: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\Windows6.1-KB976462-v2-x64.msu"/IDFX: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\Windows6.0-KB974405-x64.msu"/Sync: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\Synchronization.msi"/FilterPack: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\FilterPackx64.exe"/ADOMD: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\SQLSERVER2008_ASADOMD10.msi"/ReportingServices: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\rsSharePoint.msi"/Speech: "\\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\SpeechPlatformRuntime.msi"/SpeechLPK: \\o14-sf-admin\SP_prereqs\MSSpeech_SR_en-US_TELE.msi

One other thing to note is the IDFX parameter, for installing Windows Identity Foundation, should be IDFXR2 if you are installing the prerequisites in Windows Sever 2008 R2 or Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 - So make sure your arguments file is relevant to the OS you have.