Word 97 Locks up when too many tables

[Argar]

Hi,

I've got a problem with Word 97 running on Win 98. When my user creates or loads a document with more than about three pages of tables it just locks up Word. It only happens after the document has been saved, and I can't recreate the problem on any other machine, however, once the document has been affected it will then lock up on any machine that tries to read it. Documents that were created and worked fine when the machine was running Win 95 are also affected.

I've run three up to date virus scans on the thing, disabled macros, updated to office release 1 and then 2, deleted and recreated the normal.dot template, deleted and reinstated the acl files, saved into rtf (and rtf files created in this way display the same syptoms).

Just for reference the machine is running a Duron chip, although I can't see how this would affect it???????

Any ideas appreciated.

Thanks

 

[Dreamboat]

Argar:

I've seen this happen more and more. Answer was to save as RTF, close it, then reopen it. Only we did this with Word 2000. So, if it happens, take the doc to a machine that has 2K...make sure it's set to "don't use features not available in Word 97..."

To prevent it, make sure they're not saving as older versions (tools-options-save tab). Alot of ITs changed Word so it would save as 6.0/95/97 and this is no longer needed (usually).

When you save as RTF, make sure they close it and then reopen it.
techsupportgirl@home.com
Brainbench MVP for Microsoft Word

http://www.brainbench.com

 

[Guest_imported]

Hmmmm..... You may have a point there, it does appear that Word is asking if you want to save as a Word document. However, I have now upgraded the machine to Word 2000. Had a lot of problems with it too - firstly it gave me a file permissions error and then started deleting files, solved that with sr1a (52Mb download for a couple of cruddy Word patches - sheesh).

Now Word2000 is going absolutely ape, it opens documents with no formatting, then opens them again with formatting, then doesn't then does, then says they don't exist. I have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA what is going on - certainly can't identify a pattern. It might help if I could work out whether the files I'm trying to open were saved as Word 97 or Word 6.0 files. Any ideas????

Cheers

Rich

 

[Dreamboat]

"Now Word2000 is going absolutely ape, it opens documents with no formatting, then opens them again with formatting, then doesn't then does, then says they don't exist. I have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA what is going on - certainly can't identify a pattern. It might help if I could work out whether the files I'm trying to open were saved as Word 97 or Word 6.0 files. Any ideas????"

Word does not go ape, People just don't understand what they're doing. No offense, Rich. Hit File-Open and look at the "files of type" at the bottom. It's probably got Recover text from any file selected...

Defaults in Word 6 = no borders on tables so it might appear that tables are gone when they really just don't have borders. Also, make sure all PCs are set to show gridlines because that'll make it look like there's a table/no table too.


techsupportgirl@home.com
Brainbench MVP for Microsoft Word

http://www.brainbench.com

 

[Guest_imported]

Cheers Dreamboat,

Mmmm... If there was any logic to what Word was doing I'd agree with you - the following is true:

At any point in time Word can open any given .doc document from any location and it will be either OK or the formatting will have disappeared. If the formatting is gone then it certainly does show autorecover on the File open menu, otherwise its fine. Note that this behaviour is not consistent, the same document can appear to be OK and then revert back to naffness at any time.

I have written a VBA routine which goes through a directory, opens all files and then saves them in a different format, so I suppose I could resave everything as Word 97 format - reckon that'd do it????

Thanks for your help on this anyway

Rich

 

[Dreamboat]

Using "recover text..." option opens without any formatting. You must change it to say Word doc.

And...I reckon.
techsupportgirl@home.com
Brainbench MVP for Microsoft Word

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