Not enough memory to run Excel

G

Guest

I have been using Microsoft Office Excel 2003 for months. Everything was
working just fine until a few days ago. Every time I try to open one of the
few Excel documents I have on my laptop, I get the following message: "Not
enough memory to run Microsoft Office Excel. Please close other applications
and try again." I haven't installed anything new. In an effort to open an
Excel document, I have deleted uninstalled a couple of applications and I
have deleted many files...still can't open Excel. I have been instructed to
insert the CD to reinstall Excel (which I have done) and still can't open
Excel. It works fine on my PC but the problem is on my laptop. It's a small
laptop...8.79 GB used and 20.6 GB free space. Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks.
 
G

Guest

How much RAM do you have? You can tell by going to Start->(Settings->)Control
Panel->System. Also, have you rebooted the computer?

Is it just one file? If it is just one file, is there anything special
about it? If not, open Excel and go to File->Open, browse to the file and
select it, then click on the drop-down arrow next to the Open button and
choose Open and Repair. Does that open the file?

See: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/297892
 
G

Guest

I have 504 MB of RAM. It's a Pentium III, Mobile CPU 1133 MHz; 1.13 GHz. I
have rebooted the computer without any change. It is not just one file, I
can't even open Excel. I have been asked if I want to open in the safe mode
and I've said yes but still no luck. I have been asked if I want to "open
and repair" and I have clicked yes...no luck. I have been asked to install
the original CD and I have been told Excel has been successfully
installed...no luck. Sorry about the duplicate questions, but I wrote the
second item for discussion because I was told the first did not go through.
I was also told the second item I posted for discussion did not go through.
Any other thoughts. Thanks.
 
D

David McRitchie

When dealing with such problems the following are important
operating system, RAM, version of Excel, and speed. Besides being
useful at helping solve your problem it gives me an idea of out of date
my system is. Please give information for both systems.

Since you have one system that the file works on, you might check out the
file on your laptop where you can also change file. BTW you might want
to make a copy of the file for offline backup at this time while it still works
on one system. Things like last cell locations (what is size of file),

Do you have a lot of graphics, a lot of object type (ctrl+K) hyperlinks,
email address, shapes, comment boxes, text boxes. Check your
last cell with Ctrl+End

On the system where the file is not working try clearing out your
temporary internet files in Internet Explorer. You might also clear out you
Recycle Bin, system temporary files, and temp files for other browsers
just to keep things clean. Then take a look at
http://www.mvps.org/dmcritchie/excel/slowresp.htm
Also look for link to Charles Williams' site, Memory and Limits..
 
G

Guest

If you go to Start->Run, type in "excel /safe" (without the quotation marks)
and click OK, does Excel open?
 
G

gary191

Nick B and David, I have been trying to reply to your comments for day
on the Microsoft Newsgroups forum and I have been unable to because
have been getting a message telling me the page is not available.
found this site and I had to change my username and password so I coul
respond to your questions.

First, Nick, I have 504 MB of Ram. To David, my OS is Windows XT Hom
edition; 504 MB of Ram; version of Excel is Office 2003 (11); I onl
have 4 Excel documents on my laptop and the largest file is 19.5 KB
they are only words and numbers...no graphics, no boxes, nothing fancy
and I clean out my Temp files and Recyle bin at least once
week...generally every day or everyother day. I still cannot ope
Excel because I get the "Not enough memory to run Excel..." message
 
G

Guest

Few things to try:
Go to Start->Run, type in "excel /safe" (without the quotation marks) and
click OK.
If this works, check your xlstart folder to see if there is anything there.
If there is move it out temporarily. The xlstart folder defaults to
C:\Documents and Settings\<your user name>\Application
Data\Microsoft\Excel\xlstart\, but it is possible to have more than one so
you might want to search for it.

If the /safe switch doesn't work, try booting the computer into safe mode by
restarting it and tapping the F8 key to get the Boot Menu and selecting Safe
Mode (I have seen it take a while to boot into safe mode so be prepared).
Then try to open Excel.

Let us know what happens.
 
G

gary191

Nick, I have tried on several occassions to open Excel in the "safe
mode without success. As you suggested, I rebooted the computer in th
safe mode and tried to open Excel. I got a message asking if I wante
to open Excel in the safe mode and I clicked "yes." I then got th
message I have been getting all the time "Not enough memory to ru
Microsoft Office Excel. Please close other applications and tr
again." So I cannot open Excel even when I reboot the computer in th
safe mode. I have also received this message: "Excel failed to star
correctly last time. Starting Excel in the safe mode will help yo
correct or isolate a startup problem in order to successfully start th
program. Some functionality may be disabled in this mode. Do you wan
to start Excel in safe mode?" I have clicked "Yes" but still not luck
This sure is frustrating. I think I mentioned that I uninstalled Exce
and reinstalled it...still without success. Any other thoughts would b
appreciated
 
G

Guest

Okay, do you have Microsoft Word 2003 installed on the same computer? If so,
does that open okay?

Also, if using Windows XP Home, can you go to Start->(Settings->)Control
Panel, double-click on System, go to the Advanced tab, click Settings under
Performance, Advanced Tab, what is the Total Paging size?

Also, do you have more than one printer (or has anything with your printer
changed)? If so, can you try changing the default printer by going to
Start->Printers, right-clicking on another one and selecting "Set as
Default". If you do not have any other printers in the Printers folder, try
adding a new fake one via the Add Printer Wizard (preferably a different
model printer) and set that as the default and then open Excel. -- Shooting
in the dark now since Excel Safe mode had the same problem and ruled out a
number of things...
 
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Possible your MS Excel is corrupting, if so, try Excel repair, may try to open the necessary *.xls, *,xlt, *.xlsx, xlsm, *.xltm, *.xltx, *.xlam file and see an error message on the screen instead of it: Microsoft Excel unable to read file, This file is not in a recognizable format, etc, recover data after viruses, problems with media (a hard drive failure, a corrupted CD or DVD, etc.), errors in transferring the file via the LAN or the Internet.
 
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Guys, it's not about the memory or the system performance parameters. The problem is that some of the Windows system files were corrupted due to an installation of a program like Crystal XP for modifying Windows color and icons appearance. This issue can be fixed with Windows repair option of the Windows installation CD.

1. Put the Windows installation CD into the CD-ROM and restart your computer.
2. Press any key to boot from the CD
3. When you come to the screen where the previous installations are being detected, choose Repair (by pressing R) of the actual Win installation
4. Wait until the setup recopies and reconfigures the Windows; no application changes will be made

When the setup finishes, the problem will definitely be resolved.


I tried this on my PC and it works.
 

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