Some people have problems with the GOTD offers -- I haven't, so I can't do more than speculate on what might be causing those problems... that's all I'm doing here. The quick response is often just do away with the GOTD wrapper -- to that I simply say to play the lottery, where your odds are better, & if you win you'll be able to buy whatever software you want. :)
There are several settings in Windows that can effect how software installs & runs -- some are set by so-called optimization software, some by whatever company manufactured the PC/laptop & installed Windows, & some are the result of users reading some recommendation somewhere or other. Since Vista because of diminishing returns I don't play with that stuff, so I've no idea what effects what & when. Sometimes I've seen people post that changing DEP settings helps, though at the default [Turn on DEP for essential...] I've never had a problem. At any rate if you've changed something try changing it back, but if it's something that a manufacturer or an optimization app set, the best guess I can come up with is to Google for problems installing software on your particular hardware or after running whatever optimization program -- there may be a common & easy fix you won't know about until you look, so Google.
Security software often gets the blame since the same DRM that prevents copying a GOTD offer's setup files hides those files from everything, including Security Software. Some security software doesn't mind GOTD's setup.exe, some security software allows turning its real-time scanning off, though it may or may not actually turn off when you make that selection or tell it to. There might be other ways that involve less time/effort, but unless everyone else reports no problems, AFAIK the only way to eliminate security software as the cause of problems with GOTD would be to backup & remove it entirely, & that doesn't mean just running the uninstall app -- research the particular security app(s) including versions for the best method & tools, *If* such are available. If it works either install & use some other brand of security software, if it doesn't work restore the backup, or if you prefer, restore the back up & just live with things as they were. Do note that a lot of malware includes AV software functions so that nothing else infects or compromises your system, & if legitimate security apps mistakenly ID GOTD setup as malware, it's only logical to assume malware with it's own AV would do the same.
One possible cause of problems is remnants of security software that was once installed -- if that is the case maybe app remover might help http://www.neowin.net/news/appremover-30 . Security software sends its roots deep into Windows, & is intentionally very hard if possible to remove -- if it was easy than malware could & would remove it. I got involved, got caught in that sort of nightmare twice with AV software, where it was very time consuming [I'm talking several long days] pulling those roots, & in the 1st case I was never 100% successful. So I simply won't install security software unless there's a full removal app or utility that I've tested & know works. I test any new software the same way, using VMs.
Virtual Machines are handy but they're also a bit of work to create & maintain -- if/when you have several, Windows Update Tuesday for example can make it a busy afternoon. The easiest, but also most limited VM is Microsoft's XP Mode that comes with certain versions of win7. The best *may* be VMWare, but it's also the most expensive. VirtualBox is free, is more capable than win7's XP Mode, but can get a little geeky, with many of its roots in the *nix community where that sort of thing is common. With anything but the XP Mode VM, you also need a license for the OS, the copy of Windows you'll be running virtually. When it comes to GOTD a VM can be a Very good solution, but like the GOTD offers themselves, whether it's worth it or not is a very personal decision. I've found that with many apps [regardless if they're GOTD or not] I can monitor an install in the XP Mode VM using InstallWatch Pro 2.5c, then transfer that app to my "real" Windows without a lot of the garbage involved with their normal setup routine. I've also thankfully saved myself from installing something that could take over a day to fix otherwise, possibly longer than a day if it's a long while before I noticed those problems. And of course sometimes software runs well enough, or may only run in a VM, so there's no reason or need to have it installed in real Windows.
Virtual Machines run whatever version of Windows [or *nix etc.] you've installed, in a window or full-screen in your running copy of Windows. If an app doesn't take much of your PC's/laptop's resources to run it'll usually be fine, but if that app uses everything your hardware has to offer, running it in a VM adds a couple of layers that'll make that app run quite a bit slower if it runs at all. You create VMs -- you install the VM Host software like you would any app, & once that's done you create a new Virtual Machine or PC, setting the fake hardware it'll use, e.g. how many CPU cores, how much RAM, how much disk space etc., then with the host running, you install the OS [e.g. Windows] to that Virtual Machine. There are tools [some built in, some not] for backing up &/or cloning VMs but I prefer the simplest method -- copy the virtual hard drive [vhd] the OS [Windows] is installed on, somewhere else. If you install an app to a VM & want to keep it, shut down the VM & copy that vhd to another folder, drive etc., & if you don't want to keep it, shut down the VM & copy that backup over the top of the existing vhd, over-writing it.
One possibility that has occured to me, but I've no way to test the theory out, is that a GOTD might not install because there's not enough memory or there's some other, hardware based limitation with the minimally powered systems [e.g. netbooks] you can buy today. I tend to discount this theory, because GOTD offers install fine in my XP Mode VM with 1024 MB RAM -- I could be Very wrong in thinking that OTOH because XP Pro itself would not run well in or with 1 GB of memory, so the Virtual Machine host must supply some additional amount of the host system's memory. Unfortunately the only way I can think of at the moment that *might* prove for example netbook hardware capable would be to create a bootable Windows environment on a CD or USB stick -- if a GOTD worked there it would have to mean the problem is something in Windows, whether software or Windows itself would still be unknown. However these sorts of Windows environments can use more RAM since they often use virtual disks created entirely in memory [Windows normally writes any overflow to disk], so if the GOTD didn't work it might prove nothing more than a waste of time. That said, beyond curiosity &/or liking to tinker with PCs & such, these bootable environments can come in Very handy when you've got a problem with a laptop or PC, &/or want to be able to boot into *your* customized Windows away from home/office, so if you've got reason to create one anyway, trying to install a GOTD while running such an environment would be trivial. If interested Microsoft has lots of info on-line, Google winpe ISO, &/or check out reboot.pro .
[A quick note giving a good example of how monitoring an install in a VM can be useful, the Pavtube DVD Creator added an unwanted/unneeded hacked driver which is known to cause some people problems, plus it added some older, usually unneeded MS C/C++ runtimes that make a large contribution to Windows bloat & likely need updating immediately. ]