Word documents in XP SP3 not opening?

[sonia-kelly]

Hi.... Is there anyone out there who can help me... I am at my wits end... I can normally sort out problems with my PC, however, this one is really getting to me..... I hve tried absolutely everything but I know that somewhere there is a computer wiz kid who can help me?

I cannot open any of my documents which have previously been saved in Word, I have Windows XP - Service Pack 3... when I try to open a document I either receive a message about 'a converter', or various other error messages.....

PLEASE HELP ME AS THIS IS REALLY DRIVING ME NUTS!!!!

Many thanks - Patricia

 

[muckshifter]

please post shots of error message

what version of word?

 

[sonia-kelly]

Hi... Many thanks for your reply.................. I have just tried to open some of the documents (Windows, Word 2003) - however, the error mssages seem to have changed!.... all of the documents which I tried to open display the same error message ie, "select the encoding that makes your document readable"..... 'WINDOWS' is selected as default, there are two other options ie, 'DOS' and 'other' and unerneath there is just a lot of letters and numbers/symbols which do not make any sense whatsoever?...... As I mentiuoned in my 'plea for help' I hve tried everything.... I hae tried to download a converter, I hve followed instructions how to remove a file from the registry and I have also clicked on various areas/choices in order to be able to 'open any files in any format'... none of these hve been totally useless........ I hve no iea why the error mssages have changed but they all seem to have the same error mssage now????? I would be really, really grateful if you could steer me in the right direction in order to sort out this problem!!!. Kind regards - Patricia

 

[muckshifter]

I'm afraid I'm no Word expert, I actually don't use it. Your document may be corrupted or damaged.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/826864

I would also like you to pop over to BleepingComputers just to ask them if they would help you check you haven't been infected with one of them "hold you to ransome" virus, like Cryplocker. I hasten to add, I do not think that is the case here, but they are good at their stuff.

In the meantime, one our regular Word users may have some insight to your problem.

 

[alow]

Those messages usually come from a corrupted file, as mucks mentioned. If you are using Word 2003 without the add in to read 2007 and newer file types (files ending in an "x", like ".docx") you may receive this message as well. Any information you can provide as to the file extension and source of the document may help. At this point, if you aren't familiar with editing the registry, there are also chances that you could have broken a file type association.