Ninite 64-bit trick

Here’s an undocumented tip on how to force Ninite to install the 64-bit version of a package, when autodetection erroneously installs the 32-bit version.

Ninite screenshot (from the website)

What is Ninite?

First things first. In Windows it’s very cumbersome and inconvenient to install software, and keeping it up to date is even worse. There’s almost as many procedures as there are programs. One of the worst is Java. I often got disturbed while working by a popup, where I had to enter username as password to give it administrator rights, just to get told that there is no updates.

One solution is Ninite. You simply go the website, select which programs you like to install and keep up to date in an easier way, and click “Get Installer”. What you get is a small customized EXE-file. The idea is that you run that EXE-file regularly. When you run it, for every program you selected on your website, if it is not installed, it will download and install the latest version. If it is installed, it will make sure it’s updated to the latest version. It will do this “hands off”. You just start it at go make yourself a sandwich. When you get back, it’s probably done.

This is a big help for me. It’s much easier to keep my work computer up to date (most of the programs I install manually). Also, I no longer have to remote login and “fix” my mothers computer every time there’s an update for Java or her anti-virus, and the follow-up discussion of how unnecessarily cumbersome the update procedures are. I simply turn off the update-detection and run Ninite regularly.

So what’s the problem with 64 bit?

Ninite claims that the installer will automatically detect if you need the 32-bit or the 64-bit version, and install the right one. I don’t know if it works in some cases, but at least in some it will simply install the 32-bit version of the program when you use the free version of Ninite. For example when installing JDK in 64-bit Windows, I get the 32-bit version. This doesn’t work very well with other 64-bit software and results in strange errors. I talked with Ninite, and they admitted the problem.

The trick

So the trick they told me is simply to add an “x” to the package name to force the 64-bit version. Currently this works with Java, JDK and K-Lite Codecs. So the procedure is:

1. Go to ninite.com, select the packages you want and click “Get Installer”.
2. Delete the downloaded file (or cancel the download if you’re fast enough).
3. Notice that the URL contains the id’s of the selected packages. I selected Java, JDK and K-Lite Codecs and got this: http://ninite.com/java-jdk-klitecodecs
4. Add an “x” after the id’s you want to force to 64-bit and load the page again, like this: http://ninite.com/javax-jdkx-klitecodecsx
5. Check that all the packages you chose are still listed under “This installer includes” in the top right. If any disappeared, it means that that packages cannot be forced to 64-bit in this way, or you probably did something wrong.
6. Enjoy your even-more-custom EXE-file.

Bonus tip for experts

So how did I get a list of packages that supports this trick?

1. Go to ninite.com
2. Run this Javascript: $("input[type=checkbox]").each(function(){this.checked = true; this.value = this.value+"x";})
3. Click “Get Installer”
4. Notice the list of packages under “This installer includes”