Slides Hang - Error Message

[Dick]

I have a friend with PowerPoint 2003 on his HP laptop. Also Windows
XP. He has several slide presentations created on an earlier version
of PP. When we try to run the presentations on the 2003, you can get
as far as slide 10 on one presentation, and slide 6 on another before
it stops and won't go further. At that point an error message pops up
saying that PP has to close. Any ideas what could be causing this, or
how to fix it? This is a new install of 2003. Install again?

 

[David M. Marcovitz]

First step is to go to the Help menu and choose Check for Updates. Follow
the instructions to install Service Pack 1 and/or 2.
--David

--
David M. Marcovitz
Microsoft PowerPoint MVP
Director of Graduate Programs in Educational Technology
Loyola College in Maryland
Author of _Powerful PowerPoint for Educators_
http://www.PowerfulPowerPoint.com/

 

[Dick]

Thanks David. If it were my computer, that's the first thing I do
when I install a new program. He is doing the update right now.

Dick

 

[David M. Marcovitz]

OK. Let us know if that helps. It might not solve the problem, but I
wouldn't try to solve any problem in PowerPoint 2003 without Service Pack
1 at a minimum.
--David

--
David M. Marcovitz
Microsoft PowerPoint MVP
Director of Graduate Programs in Educational Technology
Loyola College in Maryland
Author of _Powerful PowerPoint for Educators_
http://www.PowerfulPowerPoint.com/

 

[Dick]

OK. I haven't heard back from him yet.

Dick

 

[Dick]

I decided to bring the computer home so I could spend more time with
it. Windows XP was reporting that it was unstable, so I ran chkdsk on
the drive and it seems to be fine now. I then ran the PP repair and
downloaded and installed SP2. PP seems to run fine also.

I really think there is something wrong with the particular slides
that cause the error. The main program he needs has 55 slides. When
I get to number 10 it crashes and gives the error message. If I start
at slide 11, I can continue on without a problem. It's always slide
10 that stops the program.

Is there any way to validate a slide? Or is the only choice to
rebuild it from scratch?

Dick

 

[David M. Marcovitz]

It seems that the corruption on the hard disk has corrupted this
presentation. It also seems to be affecting only slide 10. You might want
to look at the advice at:

Recovering a corrupt presentation
http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/FAQ00108.htm

You might also try the advice here:

HTML "Round-tripping" to repair corruption
http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/FAQ00526.htm

My guess is that you are going to have to rebuild the damaged slide.

--David

--
David M. Marcovitz
Microsoft PowerPoint MVP
Director of Graduate Programs in Educational Technology
Loyola College in Maryland
Author of _Powerful PowerPoint for Educators_
http://www.PowerfulPowerPoint.com/

 

[Dick]

Here's some more info on the problem. I copied the file to my desktop
which has PP97 installed. The presentation runs perfectly. The
laptop owner is fairly certain the presentation was created in PP97.

There are still problems with Windows on the laptop. I am in the
process of reinstalling Windows XP.

 

[Dick]

Your analysis appears to be correct David. Apparently it was Windows
XP that was corrupted, not PowerPoint. After I re-installed Windows
XP everything works like it should, including the PowerPoint
presentation. Thanks for the help.

Dick