This article describes how to uninstall Symantec Endpoint Protection (SEP) using Microsoft Installer (MSI) commands at the command line interface. This is useful if SEP is not listed in Add or Remove Programs.
This is also useful if a command-line is needed to uninstall the SEP Client using a third party tool such as SCCM, Altiris, Clarity, etc.
(Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_Product -Filter "Name='Symantec Endpoint Protection'" -ComputerName . ).Uninstall()
Note: If you have password protected client uninstallation, you should disable it first and then run the script. You can disable password protection from SEPM:
THE ABOVE COMMAND line examples are the ones to use for a third-party tool for uninstall, for example what command-line to pass via SCCM
Note: If the MSI uninstall has stopped responding, follow these steps:
The uninstaller is trying to find some keys which are present in a 64-bit operating system, but they do not exist on a 32-bit operating system:
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Action ended 13:37:50: InstallFinalize. Return value 1.
MSI (s) (0C:20) [13:37:50:312]: Doing action: SxsUninstallCA
Action start 13:37:50: SxsUninstallCA.
MSI (s) (0C:34) [13:37:50:375]: Invoking remote custom action. DLL: C:\WINDOWS\Installer\MSI14D.tmp, Entrypoint: CustomAction_SxsMsmCleanup
1: sxsdelca tried opening key w/o wow64key 2: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SideBySide\PatchedComponents 3: 672 4: 0
1: sxsdelca tried opening wow64key 2: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SideBySide\PatchedComponents 3: 680 4: 0
1: sxsdelca 2: traceop 3: 1158 4: 0
1: sxsdelca 2: traceop 3: 1186 4: 0
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For difficulty with uninstalling Endpoint Protection, see also: Uninstalling Symantec Endpoint Protection with the CleanWipe utility.
For a list of available MSI command line switches, type msiexec /? at the command prompt.