Windows Vista 64 bit, installing stuff

Maybe a dumb question, and I've really got to get my son asking stuff himself...

He's got his new laptop with Vista Home Premium 64 bit, and he tried to install a game Demo. It was Doom 3, and he wasn't able to get it to work through the Steam software installation. (Steam forum users say the Doom 3 demo doesn't work on Vista, so my son thought he would try downloading the demo from the original site instead and see if that went any better.) Anyway, I left the room and by the time I got back, he had shut the laptop off and headed for bed. He said he got an Installshield error message this time, he couldn't remember the exact wording.

That sort of had me going "uh-oh", because I know Installshield can affect a lot of things and if it's not working right, that could be a rather yucky thing. I've been looking around online, without having access to the laptop or the exact wording of the message at this point. I don't know if there will be a problem installing other things, as the only other thing he has installed is the Windows updates and another game (and that's how he ended up with the Steam software, which kind of works like a browser of sorts to a whole online gaming community). McAfee updates with no problem.

First, I don't know if this laptop has the latest service pack of Vista 64 bit. I would suspect it does, it's a brand new system and the first thing we did was get on line and run the Windows update. The only thing that failed was the security update of IE 7, I suspect because IE 8 was installed.

I did wonder if, when installing things, a person should just right click and select 'run as administrator' if one is sure the program is perfectly fine. (It was from a trusted site and scanned with a fully updated McaFee first.) Vista does constantly ask the question due to the UAC, but I'm not sure if it did this time or not. I know he just double clicked the file to start the install and there were a couple of security questions.

Anyway, that's my question--with Vista, should one just right click and 'run as administrator' when installing things if you totally trust the program?

(Re the Doom 3 thing, I suppose he could see if compatibility mode is available for the installer file, although I wonder how stable that would be.)

Ah, Vista, wonderful learning curve! You know, I have the book Windows XP Plain and Simple by Jerry Joyce and Marianne Moon and it was good, so I got their Vista version. And I'm even finding that is not so clearly written and easy to follow as was the XP book. If figures, eh? Maybe my son will get fed up and use the coupon he got for the free upgrade to Windows 7. (He's lucky, I've got XP so any upgrade for me wouldn't be so simple!)

Edited to add: The file demo was downloaded in IE8. I'm just reading about this thing called 'protected mode'. Could that be the reason the installation didn't work? Would windows prevent the installation of anything downloaded in IE, and if so, how does one allow such an installation?

 

Well, at this again. He uninstalled the Steam version of the Doom 3 demo. Deleted the non-Steam version of the Demo from last night. Turned off protected mode in IE, downloaded again, this time chose the Documents folder. Turned protected mode back on. Scanned with McAfee. Ran the install file as administrator. (He's also logged in as administrator). No dice, just the message from Installshield, something to the effect of not recognizing the version of Doom 3, so I suggested he give up on that one. Some people have simply been unable to make this demo work with Vista 64 bit, although apparently the full game itself does work.

I've got another thread going on this issue of IE8 and protected mode, so I'll go over with that one for now. This thread was more about installing stuff in general, I just ended up mentioning IE 8 because I thought that might be causing the problem.