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SharePoint 2013 - Setup is unable to proceed due to the following error(s): This product requires Microsoft .Net Framework 4.5

Synopsis

I recently ran into this issue while deploying SharePoint Server 2013.  Everything seemed to go according to plan, before SharePoint Gods decided to throw yet another lightning bolt my way.

Shortly after getting the software prerequisites successfully installed (accompanied by a couple of reboots of course), it was time to install the SharePoint Server software bits.  About a minute after executing the bootstrap (setup.exe) this error message comes up:

"Setup is unable to proceed due to the following error(s): This product requires Microsoft .Net Framework 4.5"

Here is an exact screenshot:


Unless I was loosing my mind, I was pretty confident the software prerequisites installation completed successfully, which performs all the necessary checks and balances on the system, including the installation of .Net Framework 4.5.

The Problem

After running around and attempting to re-install .Net Framework 4.5, which by the way didn't resolve the issue, I proceeded to check the current version of .Net Framework inside the registry.  This can easily be done via Windows PowerShell by executing the following cmdlet at the prompt:

Get-ChildItem 'HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4\Client'

This quickly revealed that the current version of .Net Framework was 4.6.x and not 4.5.x.  This presents a bit of a challenge since SharePoint Server 2013 software is strictly checking against 4.5 and not higher.

Further research uncovered an actual KB article released by Microsoft regarding this exact issue.  You can read about it here: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3087184

It appears that a recently released patch upgraded the .Net Framework from 4.5.x to version 4.6.x, leaving no trace for the bootstrap program to verify any existence of the previous version.  What now!  Keep reading.

The Solution

The trick is finding the specific KB update which applied the version upgrade and uninstalling it.  In my case this was KB3102467.

Following steps should get you to the promise land:
  1. Uninstall KB3102467
  2. Reboot the machine
  3. Run Setup.exe to install SharePoint Server 2013 software - success!
  4. Run Windows Update to re-install KB3102467
Perform the steps above on each of the server instances.

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