Word 2007 files take forever to open in Vista (was: Will an SSD help?)

[dencorso]

I don't know from memory. And I cannot check just now, sorry. Now, to open a specific file, the "%1" should be substituted by the *fully qualified file name* of that file (i.e.: c:\abab\cdcd\efef\ghghghgh.doc, for example).

[JorgeA]

I don't know from memory. And I cannot check just now, sorry. Now, to open a specific file, the "%1" should be substituted by the *fully qualified file name* of that file (i.e.: c:\abab\cdcd\efef\ghghghgh.doc, for example).

dencorso,

The Word document in question is located in a different folder altogether from the Office12 subdirectory (under Users). Just to make sure I understand -- When entering the filename, I should type in the full directory path for the Word document (in addition to that for WINWORD.EXE), right?

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

BlouBul,

I'm replying to your post just after seeing dencorso's. I will wait for confirmation on that question before proceeding. It looks like in addition to typing in the entire path for both the program and the document, I also have to include that /n switch, would that be right?

By the way, I have to say that it's pretty neat to be having a troubleshooting discussion involving people from at least three different continents. A mere quarter-century ago this would have been unimaginable to probably 99.9999% of people around the world. Amazing...

--JorgeA

Edited October 2, 2010 by JorgeA

[dencorso]

Yes. It's quite incredible. Or mind-boggling.

And yes, the /n is needed.

And the reason I'm somewhat terse today is that I'm helping piikea partition his External HDD in real time over in another thread, right now. And he's in the West Coast USA, while I'm in Brazil.

Ain't that wonderful?

[BlouBul]

Hi dencorso,

Thanks for the reply. I just googled the /n, it means no new default doc, I cant find anything on the /e (although it seemed to work for someone before). If the /n doesn't work, maybe he can try /e (or both), although the DDE-myth might have been busted already for his system.

If that doesn't work, maybe we should rename this thread to something more suitable (like Word 2007 files take forever to open in Vista) and move it to a thread where we might get a couple of cents from the other continents as well. Maybe the real software gurus won't read a thread regarding SSD in the hardware department. What do you think?

Got to go now, my wife expects me to work in the garden today and I'm not allowed near my computer, but I'll try to make plan...

[dencorso]

I was considering moving it for some time already...

So be it! Moved. And thanks, BlouBul, for the good new title.

[JorgeA]

dencorso,

I tried opening that file from the Run box. Looks like I'm going to need additional assistance here.

Typed in the full directory path for both WINWORD.EXE and the Word file in question, and then clicked on the "OK" button in the Run box to get it going. Word itself opened fine, but then I got a series of error messages saying that it could not open the file.

As I saw each error message in turn, I noticed that it was trying to open documents that do not exist! What appears to have happened is that as the file's name has several words in it, it was treating each word in the filename as if it were a separate file. For example, if the filename were "dencorso test October 2.doc", it would try to open a file "dencorso.doc", then a file "test.doc", next a file "October.doc", and finally a file named "2.doc", telling me each time that (of course) it could not find that non-existent file.

I'll rename the file in question for testing purposes, but -- as with disabling repagination -- that approach would involve reducing Word's functionality (in the sense that I would have to live with hard-to-read filenames), so it would not be practical on a day-to-day basis.

--JorgeA

UPDATE: I renamed the file to a single word, and tried to open it that way. Turns out that the FOLDER's name would also have to be a single word, as it's looking for subfolders under each individual word in the folder's name.

Edited October 2, 2010 by JorgeA

[BlouBul]

Hi JorgeA,

Try rename the file to something like test.doc and save it in the root directory. This is not a workaround we would always want you to do, but just a test as to guide us what is wrong.

[BlouBul]

One quick question: Are all files taking long to open, or only some files?

[JorgeA]

Hi JorgeA,

Try rename the file to something like test.doc and save it in the root directory. This is not a workaround we would always want you to do, but just a test as to guide us what is wrong.

BlouBul,

Welcome back from garden duty!

I gave the file a one-word name, put it in a one-word directory under Users (it wanted administrator approval to copy it to the root directory), and then opened it in Word. The loading time was 3:34.

What do you think?

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

One quick question: Are all files taking long to open, or only some files?

BlouBul,

The pattern seems to be that the bigger the file is, the longer it takes to finish loading.

BTW, I just ran a second test using that same method via Run. Time: 5:36. Unbelievable!

--JorgeA

[BlouBul]

BlouBul,

Welcome back from garden duty!

I gave the file a one-word name, put it in a one-word directory under Users (it wanted administrator approval to copy it to the root directory), and then opened it in Word. The loading time was 3:34.

What do you think?

At least I'm allowed to work on my computer again.

There is still no improvement , I think we have to think of different strategies now.

The pattern seems to be that the bigger the file is, the longer it takes to finish loading.

That will make sense, but what happen if you open a 10k file? Is that instantaneous or does that also take a long time. Are all the files from the same source (e.g. created from the same template/master file?)

[JorgeA]

BlouBul,

I re-ran the trial, and this third time it was back down to 3:27.

To give you a more complete answer as to the size of the files vs. the loading time, there seems to be a relationship but it's not linear. I've been working lately on a 199-page (746K) Word document, and I just timed it -- 33 seconds to finish loading!!

(Incidentally, and especially if we intend to make calculations, I should point out that I got the size of the big file wrong. It's 7.08MB, not 13MB -- when I reported that, I was looking at something else and thinking it was that file. )

...what happen if you open a 10k file? Is that instantaneous or does that also take a long time.

A one-page, 25K file took less than 3 seconds to finish loading.

Are all the files from the same source (e.g. created from the same template/master file?)

These various files each have their own independent origin.

Hope this helps. Thanks for sticking with me on this!

--JorgeA

Edited October 2, 2010 by JorgeA

[BlouBul]

To give you a more complete answer as to the size of the files vs. the loading time, there seems to be a relationship but it's not linear. I've been working lately on a 199-page (746K) Word document, and I just timed it -- 33 seconds to finish loading!!

(Incidentally, and especially if we intend to make calculations, I should point out that I got the size of the big file wrong. It's 7.08MB, not 13MB -- when I reported that, I was looking at something else and thinking it was that file. )

A one-page, 25K file took less than 3 seconds to finish loading.

These various files each have their own independent origin.

Hope this helps. Thanks for sticking with me on this!

--JorgeA

No, I'm not trying to do calculations. The exact sizes are not really important. When everything works normally, it should be measured in seconds, not minutes. I was just hoping that only some files were affected by this bug, and others were opening normally. Then we could have tried to see why. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the case. Back to square 4 (I think we have eliminated the hdd, processor and DDE), so at least there was some progress so far.

One more thing, I found this here

Tried everything. – uninstalled, re-installed, ran CCleaner to get rid of temp files and reg entries, did ''Ignore other applications that use DDE'', deleted personal.xls, disabled plug ins, deleted pdfmaker, NOTHING worked.

The following did:

In Registry, scroll down to >

HKEY_CURRENT_USER > Software > Microsoft

Here you will find a folder named 'Office'. Rename it, for e.g. to 'OfficeOld'.

[This folder has subfolders which might include 8.0 and 11.0, which are probably for older versions of Office installed on that machine, and these dont go away even after uninstalling these older versions. Even running CCleaner on temp files and reg files didnt make them go away, and whatever the problems were they were causing. The new 'Office' folder which gets created when you open Office 07 for the first time after renaming it, only has Office 12.0]

Just check with dencorso that it is safe to do that. (and you might lose all your settings)

I'm gonna sleep over it now, need some new inspiration (and it was a long day). Hopefully someone else will come up with something now, I am running out of ideas.

Edited October 2, 2010 by BlouBul

[puntoMX]

Just check with dencorso that it is safe to do that. (and you might lose all your settings)

Better to export parts of a registry and delete what you exported, so you can add it back later without puzzling where and what you changed.

---

Out of ideas is correct, just re-read what I said in my first post in this topic. Your windows registry is messed up way beyond repair due to cleaning too much up (Norton could have had a hand in there, sorry, but I've seen it before). What brand of HDD do you have Jorge?