Install Microsoft SDK on Win7

Tonight is a both difficult and "teaching" night. I am very excited to record what I learned, thanks to those obstacles and questions.

Goal: Install Microsoft SDK 7.1 to work with MATLAB.

I have got three types of SDK but didn't know which to install. They are GRMSDK_EN_DVD.iso, GRMSDKX_EN_DVD.iso and GRMSDKIAI_EN_DVD.iso. So here came my first question - what's the difference? Googling my question, it turned out that GRMSDK_EN_DVD is for x86, adding an X to GRMSDK for x64, and adding IAI for Itanium. OK, I chose the "X" one to cooperate with my MATLAB which is x64 version.

When installing the SDK, "return code 5100" baffled me a lot. Answer is in stackoverflow. I uninstalled Visual C++ 2010 Redistribute, but there were Visual C++ 2010 Designtime, Visual C++ 2010 Runtime and Visual C++ 2010 Redistribute. Again what's the difference? Stackoverflow is amazing, right? It tells me the difference is like difference between debug and release. Fine, continue installation.

Great! Successfully installed!