Unable to uninstall

[Guynamedg 1]

Somehow I have ended up with Emby installed in 2 locations C:\users.....\Roaming...   and also   D:\Users....\Roaming...   (Win 11)

Probably due to this I was having a lot of issues with emby server not being able to start.  So I wanted to completely uninstall and the reinstall the server.

The Uninstall went as expected and uninstalled the  D:\ version.  I attempted to uninstall the C:\ version  by going to 
C:\users.....\Roaming\Emby-server\System and running MediaBrowser.unistaller.exe but that produces the error "Please us 'Programs and Features' to uninstall"

 

If I go to Apps>Installed Apps I can surprisingly, still see Emby Server, clicking uninstall gives the error message  "Windows cannot find D:\users......MediaBrowser.unistaller.exe"  Which makes sense because it was uninstalled.

Is there a way around this loop?

[Abobader 3503]

Hello Guynamedg,

** This is an auto reply **

Please wait for someone from staff support or our members to reply to you.

It's recommended to provide more info, as it explain in this thread:

Thank you.

Emby Team

[Luke 42582]

HI, since you're going to reinstall, I would suggest just deleting this folder:

C:\users.....\Roaming\Emby-server

Then you can install again after that. Please let us know if this helps. Thanks.

[Guynamedg 1]

Thanks for the response.  I deleted the folder as suggested.  After that there were no longer any Emby related folders on C:\... or D:\...

When I did the install it installed on D:\users.....\Roaming\    Not the C:\

I am attaching the  server-install.log in case that helps.   The server does seem to be working from that location.  However in various attempts to solve the issue over the past few days it has installed on C:\ and then on another attempt D:\

Thanks for your help.

server-install.log

Edited Tuesday at 02:43 PM by Guynamedg
clarity

[visproduction 361]

On 6/14/2026 at 11:27 AM, Guynamedg said:

Probably due to this I was having a lot of issues with emby server not being able to start.  So I wanted to completely uninstall and the reinstall the server.

Please explain what exactly you mean by this. I believe Emby will not start automatically in WIndows 11, until you set it to do so.  Is that your issue?

THe log is rather hard to read.  I have not noticed long logs with only bout 20 carriage returns.  Maybe that is how startup log looks.

d: seems used correctly at the end of the log:
 

MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Creating backup by moving D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Emby-Server\system to D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Emby-Server\System.old
MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Extract successful.  Will now delete archive C:\Users\garyw\AppData\Local\Temp\0ec760fb61f348ba9914474142c8b0e0\Mbserver.7z
MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Deleting any old updates as well.
MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Creating shortcuts
MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Creating start menu shortcut D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Emby\Emby Server.lnk
MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Creating dashboard shortcut D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Emby\Emby Server Dashboard.lnk
MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Creating uninstaller shortcut
MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Attempting to start program D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Emby-Server\system\EmbyServer.exe 
MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Installation complete

 

I believe that after this success, Emby will still not start up by itself when you reboot the server.  In WIndows 11 you probably have to go in and designate Emby to start up with Windows.

Hope that helps.

[Guynamedg 1]

Thanks for your response.

The original problem (which is no longer present) was that when I clicked the .lnk I would get an error message in the browser "Unable to connect to the server...."  Manually putting in the Local host address also was unsuccessful.   I would run the installer and everything would be fine.  But when i came back a few days later the same error occurred.

At some point I noticed that Emby server was installed in both;  C:\users.....\Roaming\  and also D:\users.....\Roaming\  and thought that may be causing the problem. However, I wasn't able to uninstall the C:\ Instance to do a clean reinstall.  Luke suggested deleting the directory on C:\.  I did that but when I ran the installer it installed on D:\  which I gather is not normal.

The server is running normally now, but as I mentioned, over the past few days of troubleshooting it has sometimes it has installed on D:\ and at least once on C:\

I could manually reformat the log if that would help.

 

 

[Luke 42582]

@sa2000

[sa2000 780]

@Guynamedg What is the story for having both C:\ and D:\ sets of App Data ?

The installer is mixing both drives - 

MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Extract successful.  Will now delete archive C:\Users\garyw\AppData\Local\Temp\0ec760fb61f348ba9914474142c8b0e0\Mbserver.7z

MediaBrowser.Server.Installer.exe Information: 0 : Creating start menu shortcut D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Emby\Emby Server.lnk

 

which is strange - I will see what %TEMP% is set to when you send me the output from the command below:

 

Please start a command prompt window (cmd.exe) and then type this command 

set  > env_2026-06-18a.txt

and then send me the output file - which will be in the current directory for the command prompt session:   output file:  env_2026-06-18a.txt

and send me the file by Private Message

 

[Guynamedg 1]

1 hour ago, sa2000 said:

@Guynamedg What is the story for having both C:\ and D:\ sets of App Data ?

Thanks for the help.

At one point this computer had a very small C:\ (SSD) so a couple of years ago I tried to have some programs on  another drive (D:\). 

I have since had someone replace the C:\, so thought I would try to get Emby back on C:\ as it was having issues.  That's what started the thread.

I have forwarded the requested file.   Thanks again.

[sa2000 780]

Thank you

I have looked at the environment variables and it is a mix of C and D with most on C

I would say this is an unsupported environment 

Have a look at the mismatches with some env variables going to C and some going to D

APPDATA=D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming
HOMEDRIVE=C:
HOMEPATH=\Users\garyw
LOCALAPPDATA=C:\Users\garyw\AppData\Local
TEMP=C:\Users\garyw\AppData\Local\Temp
TMP=C:\Users\garyw\AppData\Local\Temp
USERPROFILE=C:\Users\garyw
 

Is your C Drive now big enough for you to go back to C Drive for the %APPDATA% area?

Or switch everything to the D Drive ?

 

 

 

[Guynamedg 1]

14 minutes ago, sa2000 said:

Is your C Drive now big enough for you to go back to C Drive for the %APPDATA% area?

Thanks.  I have checked and Appdata would fit. 

Does that mean that  Program Files and Program files (X86) on D:\ would also move?  They could fit also.

I'm not sure of the steps to accomplish that.

[sa2000 780]

58 minutes ago, Guynamedg said:

I have checked and Appdata would fit. 

Are there lots of apps using 

D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming

Or just Emby Server? I can help you with sorting out Emby. I will assume you sort out other apps by uninstalling / re-installing on C

So shutdown Emby Server

Copy Emby Server area to the C Drive

Copying
D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Emby-Server

to be here
C:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Emby-Server

 

Similarly - if this exists 

Copying
D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Emby-InstallLogs

to be here
C:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming\Emby-InstallLogs

Then once that is done, change the environment variable for APPDATA to be the default for windows. I do not know how you managed to get it set to be 

APPDATA=D:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming

You need to get that value for APPDATA back to the default which would be 

C:\Users\garyw\AppData\Roaming

Once that is done, reboot windows

Then with Emby Server shutdown, re-install Emby Server

It should now go into the %AppData% area on the C Drive

In a command window, you can type in this command to confirm the path

echo %AppData%

58 minutes ago, Guynamedg said:

Does that mean that  Program Files and Program files (X86) on D:\ would also move?  They could fit also.

This does not affect Emby Server as it does not get installed there. 

The environment variables snapshot you sent me shows C being the default for Programs

ALLUSERSPROFILE=C:\ProgramData
CommonProgramFiles=C:\Program Files\Common Files
CommonProgramFiles(x86)=C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files
CommonProgramW6432=C:\Program Files\Common Files
ProgramData=C:\ProgramData
ProgramFiles=C:\Program Files
ProgramFiles(x86)=C:\Program Files (x86)
ProgramW6432=C:\Program Files
PSModulePath=C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C:\WINDOWS\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules

There is one env variable relating to a program on the D drive

MOZ_PLUGIN_PATH=D:\Program Files\Foxit Software\Foxit PDF Reader\plugins\

I will leave it to you to sort these applications. My advice is to stick to windows defaults - so if the C Drive is the home drive then uninstall everything that is on the D drive and re install on C 

 

Edited 13 minutes ago by sa2000