I've just installed Blender 2.49b in order to import Collada (*.DAE) files. Unfortunately, when I try to import the files, Blender gives me an error saying that Python must be installed first. I've already installed Python versions 2.7 and 3.1 and still Blender insists that Python isn't installed on my system. Any suggestions?

Thanks.

Attached Link: http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread?t=7412

Thank you for the link, haloedrain. I've seen this suggestion before, but it seems a little obtuse. Have you employed this fix yourself with success?

Yes, for me this has always been what's wrong when blender has been unable to find python.  It does seem like it shouldn't be necessary, though.

I appreciate the endorsement. I'll give it a whirl. :-)

Wow! Import now recognizes Python. Thank you haloedrain.

Unfortunately, import now fails with the following console error:

"ImportError: Module use of python27.dll conflicts with this version of Python."

Do you know what that means?

Hmmmm. I read the rest of the link and they suggested installing Python 2.0.6. I did that, changed the environment variable, but I still get console errors. Maybe I need Python 2.6?

Woohoo! It works! This time I tracked down and installed Python 2.6 since this is the version that Blender says it was compiled in. Thank you again for putting me onto the right trail!

Hooray!