Hi, for any of us facing the issue of being unable to install/ update games, which always shows an error while preparing the update, or facing the error code INST-14-12029. I tried several different ways and finally solved this.
I only encountered this issue on my Windows device (both Windows 10 and 11). If you encounter a similar problem on MAC, maybe try using a similar approach.
Here is my step:
(If you have the EA app installed on your device but cannot update or start the game, jump to step 2)
1. If the EA app is not installed and you are facing the error code INST-14-12029 when using the EA installer, try the link:
https://origin-a.akamaihd.net/EA-Desktop-Client-Download/installer-releases/EADesktop-12.0.58.4866-242.msi
or
https://origin-a.akamaihd.net/EA-Desktop-Client-Download/installer-releases/EAapp-13.207.0.5720-2944.msi
*If these links show no connection again, please find another device (in my case, only the devices I used to play cannot access the link; all other devices of my family members work even with the same WLAN) to access this link. Then, any online drive can easily share the file to install the entire EA app with your device.
2. Use control+shift+esc or any other way to open the Task Manager. Choose the services tab. Find the EABackgroundService. Right-click on that and choose to restart (or stop the service and start it).
3. Then open the ea app and Clear the cache (From the main menu bar, select Help and choose App Recovery. For details, see this tutorial page: https://help.ea.com/en/help/ea/ea-app/game-download-install-load-troubleshoot/)
4. Then, the app will automatically restart, and you will find yourself starting to download/update the games.
If it doesn't work, you can try steps 2 and 3 several times or restart the service while the app is restarting.
Hope this helps