How to fix SQL install error (Exit code (Decimal): -2061893606)

Question

I received this error when installing SQL 22 Express.

Unable to install SQL Server (setup.exe).

Exit code (Decimal): -2061893606

Error description: Wait on the Database Engine recovery handle failed.

How can I fix this and install SQL 22?

Answer 1

The message Wait on the Database Engine recovery handle failed is a generic error that means that SQL Server did not start when Setup wanted to run configuration steps. To understand why it did not start, you need to look in the SQL Server errorlog, which you find in C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL16.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\LOG\ERRORLOG.

If you see a message about 256 misaligned reads, you are running into a known issue where Windows 11 for some disk drives reports a sector size that SQL Server does not cope with. Microsoft has published an article with workarounds for the problem.

If you don't see the message about misaligned reads, feel free to upload the errorlog here, so we can look at it. You will need to rename to ERRORLOG.txt for the forum software to accept it.