Unable to use /qn or /qb with remote deployment tools while upgrading SEE 11.0 clients to Symantec Endpoint Encryption 11.1 or later

Products

• Endpoint Encryption

Issue/Introduction

When attempting to upgrade Symantec Endpoint Encryption (SEE) clients from SEE 11.0 to SEE 11.1 or later, an error may appear indicating "/qn" is not a supported msiexec switch.

 

Resolution

Starting with Symantec Endpoint Encryption Client version 11.1, we started to use a single MSI installer for "Removable Media Encryption" and the "Management Agent". 

In order to do "Silent Installs", if you were upgrading from 11.0.x to a higher version of the SEE Client, the /qn /qb could not be used.  We created an installer option to allow silent installs when doing these types of ugprades.  This issue should no longer be an issue as 11.0.x is now considered legacy.  Once you are on Symantec Endpoint Encryption 11.1.x or above, you can start using the /qn or /qb options.

 

The SEE Upgrade Guide states there is an alternative parameter available for silent installation called "CONDITION_NOUI=1" when upgrading from SEE 11.0.  The following is an example of using this option:

msiexec /i "[path]\msifile" "CONDITION_NOUI=1" /l*vx "[logpath]\logfile

The SEE 11.1 upgrades require interactive mode, and in some cases various deployment tools may not allow this type of action or will not be enabled by default.

One potential workaround is to launch an interactive session using the PsExec tool and run the upgrade process in that session with the following syntax:

PsExec.exe /accepteula -i -s msiexec /i "SEE Client_x64.msi" /l*v "c:\SEEUpgrade.log" CONDITION_NOUI=1

 

The end result will be a completely silent install.

For more information on PsExec (v. 2.11), see Microsoft's documentation:

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/psexec.aspx

Upgrades starting with SEE 11.1 and above: 
After a client has been updated to SEE 11.1 or beyond, the /qn or /qb switches should then be used again.  CONDITION_NOUI=1 should then be removed from the client install command.  SEE 11.1 clients upgrading to newer versions of SEE 11.1+ should no longer use the CONDITION_NOUI=1 option and use only /qn or  /qb to deploy using the silent option.

REINSTALLMODE and ADDLOCAL Options:
Starting with SEE 11.1, the REINSTALLMODE=vemus and ADDLOCAL=ALL options should no longer be used in the install command for upgrades.  This was supported only in versions SEE 11.0 when separate installation packages for the Management Agent, Removable Media, and Drive Encryption were used.