Cannot Uninstall Previous Matlab Versions Due to Missing JVM

Since installing the last several versions of Matlab, my organization made a changeover from Oracle Java to Temurin JRE8. Matlab runs fine, however, when I try to uninstall any previous versions of Matlab or Matlab Runtime (there are reasons, but they are not relevant here) an error occurs, stating that the JVM cannot start:

I've tried copying the JRE folder (in Program Files\Temurin) to the Matlab/Matlab Runtime folders, but in doing so the process instead simply silently crashes in the background.

Before I just delete the Matlab folders and remove them from the environment PATH, are there any suggestions? It's a bit of a strange one, I know, but just wondering if anyone has encountered this.

Answer 1

[Jacob Mathew]

Hey Tomas,

It seems like the official solution from the MathWorks Support Team is to manually remove the MATLAB Installation folder in case the uninstall fails as referenced in the following community post:

https://in.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/92244-how-do-i-uninstall-mathworks-products-on-windows-when-the-uninstaller-fails

If you want to remove the preferences associated with the version as well, then you can refer to the following documentation to locate the folder:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/matlab_env/where-matlab-stores-settings.html

It mentions the use of a MATLAB command "prefdir" hence remeber to double check this before deleting the installation in case your preference folder is not in the default location.

[Tomas N.]

Sounds good, thanks!