Software Deployment

In order to see just what the problem actually is you should enable Windows Installer logging which will allow you to view a log of all attempts and failures related to your installation.
Generally this problem revolves around SYSTEM account permissions on the target system, free disk space on the target system, or bad file download or locked/inaccessable file. For more help...
One member reports having received this error installing MSN Messenger 6.2. They were able to get it to install successfully (and eliminate error 1603) by de-activating Ad-Watch from Lavasoft.
See InstallShield KB Article Q107182
See AppDeploy MSI FAQ

While using NetInstall 5.8: I encountered error 1603 while trying to push Litronic NetSign CAC, which is a software package for reading smartcards. By using the verbose logging feature for MSI, I was able to determine that the installer was looking for the netsignconfig.ini file, but was reporting that the file does not exist, which resulted in the install failure. I was able to create the INI file by using the nsconfigwizard.exe which comes with the NetSign software. By reading the Litronic KB and making some educated guesses, I wrote a script that copies the INI file to the "%windir%\temp" folder, and then calls the necessary MSI. This resolved the error.

This was for a mass remote MS patch update installation with Altiris. Status "Error 1603 during script execution". The rights were fine. The XPSP2 PC had IE 7 , the update was for IE 6. Lame error code, thanks for nothing Microsoft! It should have said, "Error: No condition items exist." Cool Web Site!

If your installation has a LaunchCondition defined and executed, and if it fails the LaunchCondition, the MainEngineThread will return a 1603. Look in your verbose log for info following "Action start HH:MM:SS: LaunchConditions"

I received this error while pushing out an msi through altiris deployment solution 6.8. Turns out the msi, which was created by Wise Package manager, required .NET Framework 2.0 or higher. Issue resolved after installing the updated .NET Framework.

Received Error 1603 deploying UGS NX 5 msi via Altiris Deployment Solution. Needed to run ISSCRIPT10.msi prior to UGS NX 5.0.msi to get it to install.

I encountered error 1603 on some workstations while attempting to deploy AutoCAD 2012 via SCCM. AutoCAD logs on the distribution share showed .NET 4.0 was not found on the workstations, and needed to be installed.