Installing Bazaar for PC

Bazaar for PC is the easiest way to side-load apps onto your windows phone if you don't have a homebrew marketplace installed on your phone. I had a really painful time getting this up and running so for the benefit of myself in future and possibly others, I thought I would list my set of most reliable steps to getting Bazaar for PC working.

Install steps

 1. Most people will have done this, but if you haven't - download and install the Zune software http://www.microsoft.com/windowsphone/en-us/apps/zune-software.aspx

2. Download Windows Phone SDK 7.1 ISO
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=226694

3. Use your ISO mounting tool to mount the ISO (If you don't have a tool already, Virtual Clone Drive is free and easy to use)
http://static.slysoft.com/SetupVirtualCloneDrive.exe

4. Run setup.exe in the root folder of the ISO

5. Download and install the Windows Phone SDK 7.1.1 Update
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=29233

6. Download and install Bazaar for PC
http://wp-bazaar.com/Bazaar/Bazaar/Releases/BazaarForPC.application

Usage steps

1. Start up the Zune software and connect your phone

2. Start up B4PC and enjoy

Yes that's right, for best results you should have the Zune software running at the same time as B4PC.

Why this approach?

Bazaar for PC has some dependencies such as Dot Net Framework 4.0 Full, and the install will fail if your PC doesn't have these installed. You can waste a lot of time hunting down and installing these dependencies individually, but they are all already packaged in the Windows Phone SDK 7.1 (which is also a Bazaar dependency), so you can just install this and you should have all the Bazaar dependencies.

Unfortunately there are many ways that the Windows Phone SDK 7.1 install can fail, so I strongly recommend downloading the ISO rather than the web bootstrap, otherwise if you have repeated installation attempts you will be spending a lot of time waiting for the SDK files to download.

Probably the first thing you would want to install is a homebrew marketplace so you can immediately cut the cord and install apps directly on your phone. However the marketplace apps aren't available on Bazaar for PC for some reason! This means you will have to install the marketplace apps via XapHandler. Check this app out on Bazaar for PC for instructions.

Troubleshooting the Windows Phone SDK 7.1 install

 MS instructions say to look at your %temp%\dd_install_vm_xcor2_100.txt file. You can find out where your temp folder is by opening Windows Explorer, clicking in the address bar, typing %temp% and hitting Enter.


Reading this txt file I found that the install decided to extract some files to an external drive, but was then was unable to access the files during the install. So I had to disconnect the external drive temporarily.