Symptom

When launching BarTender Designer after installing BarTender, you may receive the following error message:

Error Message #6243 Embedded tables cannot be used - SQL Server LocalDB could not be configured due to the following:

LocalDB or one of its components cannot be found on your computer. Please contact your System Administrator.

In addition, the BarTender Integration Service will not run and you'll receive an error when you try to start the service or run Integration Builder:

Applicable to

BarTender 2019 R5 and later

Diagnosis

BarTender 2019 R5 and above requires SQL LocalDB for proper operation and therefore during installation, regardless of whether you are using SQL Server or not, it will always attempt to install SQL LocalDB.

1. To verify if SQL LocalDB is properly installed, go to Windows Control Panel > Programs > Programs and Features:

2. If Microsoft SQL Server 2014 Express LocalDB  is not installed on your computer, this will cause the error message #6243 to appear when launching BarTender Designer.

Another likely reason for this error is when BarTender fails to locate the path to SqlLocalDB.exe. This may happen when BarTender is not installed on the C:\ drive.

Solution

Based on the diagnosis, there may be two solutions to this issue.

Solution #1

Reinstall BarTender on C:\ and make sure Microsoft SQL Server 2014 Express LocalDB is not removed from the computer afterwards,

Solution #2

BarTender will always verify if SQL LocalDB is installed in the following paths: 

• %ProgramFilesW6432%\Microsoft SQL Server\120\tools\binn\SqlLocalDB.exe
• %ProgramFiles%\Microsoft SQL Server\120\tools\binn\SqlLocalDB.exe
• %ProgramFiles(x86)%\Microsoft SQL Server\120\tools\binn\SqlLocalDB.exe

If your BarTender copy is installed on the D:\ drive for example, copy/paste the D:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\120\Tools\Binn folder to the C:\ drive and recreate the same directory structure: