NI Package Manager Requires Latest Version or is Too Old Notification

Issue Details

When attempting to install or uninstall NI software, I get an error stating that my version of NI Package Manager is too old.

A package you selected, or one of its dependencies, requires the latest version of Package Manager to continue with the installation. Visit ni.com/info and enter the Info Code NIPMUpdate for more information.



This version of Package Manager is too old to handle newer installed software.

Solution

The first error appears when you try to install a package with a higher compatibility version than that specified by the installed version of NIPM. The second error appears when you have software already installed on your system that has a higher compatibility version than that specified by the installed version of NIPM. To resolve these errors, upgrade your NIPM version
 

1. Restart NI Package Manager.
2. Click on the Upgrade now banner at the top of the window to upgrade to the latest version. If restarting does not trigger an automatic update, move to the next step.
3. To manually update NI Package Manager, download NI Package Manager from ni.com. If you have an offline machine, refer to Download Individual Offline Installers for NI Software to use the offline installer.

If you already have the latest version of NI Package Manager compatible with the OS, the problem could be caused by a package that is incompatible with the OS and was installed using a custom installer. Try the following troubleshooting steps:

• Check the NIPM-generated error logs to get additional information about the error and the component causing the issue. The file "agentsErrorLog.txt" can provide some insight into the package causing the error. If you do not know how to generate these log files take a look at Generating and Locating NI Package Manager Error Logs.
• If you identify that a specific package is not compatible with the Windows OS, manually remove the software that is not supported to get NIPM into a good state:
  •  You can use msiexec commands to remove the NI components that do not support the OS. 
  • Doing this will fix NIPM, but any installed software that relies on the removed components will likely be unstable and will not work.
  • Perform a repair operation on all installed products listed in NIPM to potentially mitigate issues with the installed software.

Additional Information

NI supports two installer technologies:
1. You can use our older installer technology when building custom installers with products like LabVIEW and TestStand Deployment Utility.
2. You can build installers that use NI Package Manager in those same products.

Since 2019, software that NI releases supports both technologies for creating custom installers. NIPM manages the older software and newer packages that are installed on systems, so when NIPM sees an NI component that was installed using the older installer technology, NIPM must update its list of packages that correspond to that installed component. For NIPM to work properly, NIPM must ensure that all dependent components stay installed while any installed component uses it.

In 2020, NI dropped support for Windows 7 and as such NIPM 20.6 was the last version that supported Windows 7. NIPM 20.7 and later only support Windows 10 and later. Any installer (older or package based) built on a system that has installed NIPM 20.7 or later is prevented from being installed on a Windows 7 system. It is possible to alter an installer to bypass the OS restriction, which allows the unsupported components to be installed on a Windows 7 system. This is not recommended since it will upgrade components that only support Windows 10 and later and could cause this error message when installing/uninstalling NI software.