Software Deployment

you might want to have a look at my blog on this site at http://www.itninja.com/blog/view/a-general-approach-to-software-packaging-starting-from-consistent-installer-analysis

It touches on the subject on when to prefer use of a setup.exe over (repackaging to) an MSI

For installshield based applications or which have multiple MSI to install in order. Other examples include Autodesk applications, MS Office products, Adobe CS products etc.

There are some other ways to customize these applications and install them silently.

There many reason to prefer msi than exe.firstof all see the advantages of msi.

o   Advertising

o   Installation on Demand

o   Repair (Self-healing)

o   Rollback (Transactional operations)

o   Managed Shared Resources

o   Installation in locked-down environments

This all things we can not do in exe.

if you need more clarifacation let me know.

Maybe, it is possible to add user friendly and restrictive install parameters, on command line.

The question is worded rather vaguely.

I assume the OP wants to know when it is preferable to use the vendor's set-up executable "as is" or to re-package to an MSI. For me, the answer to that is: "Always re-package". Anyone who lets loose a vendor on to their workstation build without knowing exactly what it's going to do deserves everything they get.