Folks, I received my Office 2010 through the Home Users Program and I thought it would be a simple matter of putting the dvd into the drive and autorun...
I use Win7 Ultimate and I have Office 2007 already loaded.
Every thing starts OK and I entered the Product Key when requested and it starts to install then the dreaded error message appears.
I also followed most if not all of the suggestions on here but to no avail. After two evenings and a Saturday afternoon I finally got it installed.
My solution - I'm trying to remember the sequence and correct names - was to ignore the "Install" button and go for the "Custom" install option. On opening the "Custom" install you are presented with a folder structure showing all the various Office applications.
Go to the root of these and click it - you should see an option to "Install on 1st Run" - select it and then press 'next' or 'continue' .
In my case it installed OK - however you do have to keep the dvd in your drive and then go into the Office folder in "Start" - "All Programs" and open each application in turn. Each one will then install and start - job done.
Hope this helps people in a similar position.
You are a genius, this worked perfectly. Thank you for taking the time to post. Like others I had tried everything else prior to this post.