Removal of MSXML#

A common issue we find is old and out-of-date MSXML#.dll, where the # is the version number. This is how to remove that file.

COMMANDLINE

From an administrative level command line, you can run the following commands to remove the MSXML# file, replacing the # with the version we have identified as an issue.

Navigate to the folder containing the msxml#.dll file which will likely be:
  • 32-bit systems - C:\Windows\System32
  • 64-bit systems - C:\Windows\SysWOW64
cd\windows\system32

Unregister msxml#.dll using the following command {replace # with the version we found}:

regsvr32 /u msxml#.dll

A message is displayed showing that the DLL has been unregistered and you can then go ahead and delete the files related to the msxml# install, for example, for msxml4.dll, they will be:

  • msxml4.dll
  • msxml4.inf
  • msxml4a.dll
  • msxml4r.dll
del msxml4.dll

You can confirm the file list using the directory command, dir

dir msxml*.*

This, assuming you are within the directory containing the files c:\windows\system32> for example.

 

You can find an extensive script for checking the EOL dates on the files and deleting/removing them, created by Tenable, and available here.