normal.dot read only error and Word is slow to open documents

[weigoldk]

Word is very slow to open documents. It doesn't matter if they are on the local drive or on the network.

I have re-created the normal.dot file serveral times.

I am prompted to save changes to normal.dot when I exit Word. If I say yes, I will get a read only message. Normal.dot is on the C drive and it is NOT read only (c:\documents and settings\...the default location).

I uninstall Office 2000, deleted normal.dot, reinstalled but that didn't help.

I uninstalled Office 2000 and installed Office 2003 SB, did all updates and that still didn't help.

Word will basically freeze for several minutes after opening a document.

I am running SAV antivirus and the definitions are up to date.

 

[TonyJollans]

Hi weigoldk,

Normally slow opening is because Word is looking for something which it can't find somewhere on a network.

Do you have, perhaps, an invalid network Workgroup Templates location set up? Check under Tools > Options > File Locations. These are all held in the registry so no amount of tinkering with Normal.dot (or reinstallation) will affect them.

Enjoy,
Tony

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[weigoldk]

I looked at the file locations and compared that with other users. All of those ducks seem to be in a row. Here is what that computer has (which matches my computer and my computer does not have the same symptom).

Documents H: (network user directory--set through active directory and "my documents" properties--we have this set on many PCs here)
Clipart pictures blank
User templates c:\documents and settings\username\application data\microsoft\templates
Workgroup templates blank
AutoRecover files c:\documents and settings\username\application data\word
tools c:\program files\microsoft\office11
Startup c:\documents and settings\username\application data\word\startup


The reason that I focused on normal.dot is that Word prompts to save changes to normal.dot when none have been made and then it says it is read only. If I'm barking up the wrong tree, I'll be happy to stop

Thanks for your help and suggestions.

 

[michbar]

I encountered this same problem on a users PC not too long ago. I deleted Normal.dot several times to no avail. I decided to log in as myself and check to see if I got the same problem and guess what? It worked fine for me. The problem was not with Word but with the users profile. Because she saved all files on a network drive, she never noticed that she could not save any files to the My Documents folder. For some reason the profile became corrupt and all files in that profile were being treated as read only even though they weren't marked as such. I deleted that profile and let Windows create a new one when she logged in again.

Perhaps just for kicks you can log in as a different user and see if this could be the problem.

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The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree, is by accident. That's where we come in; we're computer professionals. We cause accidents.-Nathaniel Borenstein

 

[weigoldk]

Thanks for sharing your experience.

She is admin on the PC and can delete the normal.dot file in Explorer. However, I'll give your suggestion a try. I might try deleting her profile--that thought had crossed my mind, but I was using it for the last resort.

 

[weigoldk]

Eureka!

We recently (a couple weeks ago) upgradded our data server. That PC had everything pointing to the new server (mappings, shortcuts, printers, etc.) and I checked this multiple times.

Something that TonyJollans got me to thinking, so I decided to go into the registry and delete all of the instances that referenced the old and off line server.

I'm not sure why it took so long for the computer to have symptoms or which entry(ies) in the registry was causing problems, but it's quitting time and I'm happy because
Word is now working great.

Thanks again michbar and TonyJollans.