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Convert Office 2013 Click to Run to MSI installation

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› Microsoft 365 › Convert Office 2013 Click to Run to MSI installation

Last reviewed on February 13, 2018     21 Comments

Applies to: Outlook (classic)

Retail and small business copies of Office 2013 are only available as "click to run". While this should work the same as the traditional installed (aka MSI) version, a few add-ins that haven't been properly updated for Office 2013 may not work (including Sage and SalesForce). Other users think they are missing something by not using the MSI (they aren't). Regardless of the reason, more than a few users complain that they want the old-fashioned installed version of Office.

You may need to repair Office frequently (weekly, if not more often) if you use this method.

If you have an Office 365 E account that includes Office 2013 you can convert to an MSI install. While the MSI install supports custom configurations, it's my experience that activation fails if you use a custom install and remove some applications.

I haven't tested this with the Office 365 Small Business P accounts, it may or may not work with it. It won't work with Home Premium accounts (Office suites are different).

  1. If installed, uninstall Office 2013 "Click to Run".
  2. Download and install the evaluation copy of Microsoft Office 2013 from TechNet.
  3. When prompted to activate, you'll need to use your Organizational Account, not the Product Key. If the Enter your Product Key screen comes up, click the link to Sign in with an active account instead.
  4. switch to use an active account to activate

Office may need to reconfigure and reboot a couple of times when you first use it.

Note: this uses one of your account's 5 Office 2013 installations. If you previously had Office 365 Click to Run installed, log into Software management portal and verify the computer is using only one license. If the computer is listed with two licenses, delete the older license.

Convert Office 2013 Click to Run to MSI installation was last modified: February 13th, 2018 by Diane Poremsky

Related Posts:

  • Add-ins and Outlook 2013 Click-to-Run
  • Understanding Outlook 2013 Updates
  • Office 365 or Office 2013/2016?
  • Outlook 2013 RT

About Diane Poremsky

A Microsoft Outlook Most Valuable Professional (MVP) since 1999, Diane is the author of several books, including Outlook 2013 Absolute Beginners Book. She also created video training CDs and online training classes for Microsoft Outlook. You can find her helping people online in Outlook Forums as well as in the Microsoft Answers and TechNet forums.

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Jon (@guest_192737)
August 19, 2015 1:26 pm
#192737

Hi Diane, I have a different but connected issue. I am running office 365 click to run office and whilst I was in windows 7 it worked fine with a separate MSI version of MS Project 2013 installed on the machine. Since my upgrade to W10 I have found that some files readily available on other machines will not open on mine and are reported by office as being corrupt (especially if they are emailed to me as attachments) MS told me to repair office which failed because of the MSI version of Project installed on my machine. I installed MSI version of office but this doesn't come with Skype for Business (Lync)! So I am now back to Click to Run office with an MSI Project install, along with the associated issues. Not sure what to do from here! Any suggestions would be welcome

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Diane Poremsky(@diane-poremsky)
Author
Reply to  Jon
October 23, 2015 10:40 pm
#194197

Is it this https://www.outlook-tips.net/tips/email-attachments-wont-open-after-upgrading-to-windows-10/ ?

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Geet (@guest_192037)
July 22, 2015 11:30 pm
#192037

If i uninstall Office 365 package and re install it. Will it affect my outlook calendar entries

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Diane Poremsky(@diane-poremsky)
Author
Reply to  Geet
July 23, 2015 12:03 am
#192038

No, it won't, the profile shouldn't be touched.

If they are in a folder labeled 'this imputer only' make sure you export the folders to a pst every now and again - those are as risk if something happens to your profile.

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Petru Russu (@guest_189808)
March 13, 2015 8:56 am
#189808

This is not supported. If you will have any issues you are basically on your own.

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Diane Poremsky(@diane-poremsky)
Author
Reply to  Petru Russu
March 13, 2015 11:02 am
#189810

It's also really buggy. At this point in the product cycle, the problem is with the vendors that refuse to update their addins - they've had plenty of time to update.

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Everett (@guest_188779)
January 21, 2015 1:21 pm
#188779

Why do you have to frequently repair using this method? Can I use another method that is just as easy and effective and not have to repair as much?

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Diane Poremsky(@diane-poremsky)
Author
Reply to  Everett
January 21, 2015 1:26 pm
#188780

The need to repair the installation should be rare. If you need to do it often (or even occasionally), something is causing problems. What are the symptoms? Do you use a registry cleaner?

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Everett Wheeler-Bell (@guest_188793)
Reply to  Diane Poremsky
January 21, 2015 11:39 pm
#188793

At the top of the post it says:

"You may need to repair Office frequently (weekly, if not more often) if you use this method."

I attempted the method and it failed out the gate and offered to repair, but that didn't work.

I did not try to clean the registry considering the installation failed. I'll try to clean the registry and attempt again.

Thanks,

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Diane Poremsky(@diane-poremsky)
Author
Reply to  Everett Wheeler-Bell
January 22, 2015 8:38 am
#188798

This method is really buggy - I used it maybe 3 weeks, just to see how it worked, then gave up. It wasn't worth the effort since I didn't have anything (like Sage) that I needed to use with Outlook.

It's also possible that an update after I wrote did something to block users from using this method.

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Diane Poremsky(@diane-poremsky)
Author
Reply to  Everett Wheeler-Bell
January 25, 2015 12:44 am
#188868

Using this method is really buggy - I gave up on it after a couple of weeks, it was just too annoying. It's also possible that microsoft made a change to close this 'loophole', so that it can't be used.

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Marcus Hall (@guest_188753)
January 20, 2015 10:58 pm
#188753

Thanks for your information. I have tried iCloud with one C2R install. I am waiting for results. What spooked me was the article at Apple Support. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203383 Quote: "To use either iTunes or iCloud Control Panel to keep your mail, contacts, calendars, and tasks updated between your iOS devices and Microsoft Outlook, a full version of Microsoft Outlook 2013 or 2010 must be installed on your hard drive. "

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Diane Poremsky(@diane-poremsky)
Author
Reply to  Marcus Hall
January 20, 2015 11:04 pm
#188754

I'm not sure what they mean by "full version" in regards to Outlook 2013. In the case of Outlook 2010, the click to run version that was introduced in Office 2010 (and no longer available) is not supported with iTunes (or any other addins), but they really improved it for Office 2013/365 and pretty much everything works with the click to run, with the exception of a few financial programs.

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Marcus Hall (@guest_188785)
Reply to  Diane Poremsky
January 21, 2015 3:06 pm
#188785

They mean a MSI version.

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Diane Poremsky(@diane-poremsky)
Author
Reply to  Marcus Hall
January 21, 2015 9:04 pm
#188788

A very low % of users (only corporate volume licenses) have access to the MSI version of Office 2013, which would leave some 95% of iPad/iPhone users without the ability to use iCloud. I know iCloud works with Office2013 C2R because I use it.

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Marcus Hall (@guest_188796)
Reply to  Diane Poremsky
January 22, 2015 12:12 am
#188796

Thank you for your help.

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Marcus Hall (@guest_188345)
December 30, 2014 9:54 pm
#188345

Many of my customers use iCloud. Do you know a way to get the iCloud addin to work in a C2R version

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Diane Poremsky (@guest_188347)
Reply to  Marcus Hall
December 30, 2014 11:29 pm
#188347

It should work just fine with C2R - it does here and for many of my clients. What isn't working?

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Huendli (@guest_186078)
September 19, 2014 8:46 am
#186078

Thanks for this hint, it promised to be my last hope to get a proper inplace upgrade from 2010 (including the possibility to install Office on drive D:\) with my 365 subscription. But unfortunately this doesn't work with Office 365 University. It recognizes my subscription (as 365 Home Premium though), but just tells me "your product isn't installed" with a link to that 365 user central where I don't get what I want. Will call Microsoft now and beg for a key, I paid a lot of money for a product that is totally useless to me.

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Diane Poremsky (@guest_186087)
Reply to  Huendli
September 19, 2014 11:21 am
#186087

Well, it's really not a good solution unless you absolutely need to use an addin that does not work with C2R (and there are only a few that don't), but it only works with the Enterprise-level E subscriptions - they have the same products and features. The Home version has just the basics needed by home users. (Honestly, I'll be surprised if they give you a key.)

I'm not sure what you mean by "a proper in-place upgrade" - upgrading works pretty much the same on both C2R and the MSI installs.

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Huendli (@guest_186296)
Reply to  Diane Poremsky
September 24, 2014 3:49 am
#186296

Thanks for your reply! It may not be a good solution, but at least it is one (for people with the right subscriptions), and your article is the only web source dealing with it. I've spent many hours finding another one before, including going through that terribly complicated and instable C2R deployment tool process just for learning that you are well able to select the installation source, but not its destination. What I hate about the C2R installer is the absolute lack of any options. You hit install in the portal, it opens, does something, and then Office 2013/365 is installed. It didn't replace my existing 2010 installation, but still managed to destroy my PST file, hence the line with the inplace upgrade. Fortunately, I could do without calling MS by downloading the classic 2013 ProPlus package from my university - for free (and now feeling a bit tricked having paid $80 just for 1TB OneDrive and some Skype minutes). There is still a slight hope that this issue will be fixed in a future version of the C2R installer, but as MS is going the Apple way by treating its customers as fools, I don't think this will get… Read more »

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