Fix for Zoomit.exe Error launching 64-bit version...

Had a small problem trying to get Zoomit running on a machine. It stopped working after some changes to our Group Policy in a response to a nasty virus that hit our network.

I use Zoomit frequently, and the Windows Magnifier is really not a satisfactory substitute.

Here's the error I was getting when I tried to install it:

Our tech support person found this post by Andrew Potts. It worked, but it lacked a few details that I had to work out. So I thought I would expand on it.

So it seems that running ZoomIt.exe attempts to write something into the Temp folder, which is blocked by the group policy. Apparently, this is only a problem on 64-bit machines.

The Temp folder is defined as an environment variable, which you can change in the Control Panel under System:

Or, if you are comfortable at the command line, you can change this with the SET command:

SET TEMP=C:\temp1

So here's the exact steps that I used to fix this on my machine:

1. get to a command prompt by running cmd under Start|Run
2. run the command "SET" to see the current environment variables including TEMP (no command arguments, just the command SET)
3. record the current TEMP variable value - you'll probably want to set this back to the original when you are done
4. create a folder C:\temp1
5. copy the ZoomIt.exe to the C:\temp1 folder
6. run the command "SET TEMP=C:\temp1" - sets the TEMP variable to the new folder
7. run the command "cd C:\temp1" - changes the working directory to the new folder
8. run the command "ZoomIt.exe" - runs the installer
9. you should now see a file "C:\temp1\ZoomIt64.exe" 
10. run the "SET TEMP=..." command to set the TEMP variable back to its original value

You can copy this file wherever you want, or simply leave it where it is and create a shortcut to it.