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Office 2008: Word crashes; deletes old Office; no full exchange support
Reports concerning Microsoft's new Office 2008 suite are beginning to trickle in. MacFixIt reader Bud Clark reports repeated crashes from Word 2008 -- a problem since the installer deletes Office 2004 by default (there is an option to keep the old software), meaning no working copy of Word was left on Bud's system.
"I installed Microsoft Office:mac 2008 (upgrade) today. Not unexpectedly, by default it deletes the previous installation; in my case, Office 2004. After a standard installation, with no customization, I started Word successfully for the first, and it turned out only, time. I also successfully started Excel, PowerPoint and Entourage. A few moments later, needing to try Word with some real work, I started it up again -- no go, it crashed with a "Microsoft Word has encountered a problem and needs to close" message. There's a checkbox below the apology to ask Word to recover your work and restart. I tried that -- also, no go. The error reporting dialog box allows you to tell Microsoft about the problem, so I let it. The data it sends is inscrutable (to me), there were no obvious smoking gun issues I could see. I'm running Mac OS X 10.5.1 on a MacBook Pro Hi-Res with 4GB RAM."
The fix in some cases is to delete the following file:
- ~/Library/Preferences/com.microsoft.Word.plist
Problems resizing document window In spite of the aforementioned fix, some users find that simply resizing the document window in Word 2008 results in a repeatable crash (even after deleting the .plist):
"I changed the window size, restarted Word, and it crashed immediately. I tried this with a few iterations, and my conclusion is that Word 2008 does not allow me to resize my document window."
No full Exchange support Meanwhile, as reported by APC Magazine, it appears that Entourage 2008 still does not include full support for Exchange services. Still lacking are the ability to synchronize notes or tasks with Exchange servers, view multiple calendars side-by-side, and the ability to see receipts when a recipient opens an email.
Feedback? Late-breakers@macfixit.com.
Resources
10.5.1
iMac 24
go to help and search for 'change settings for new documents'....directions have you modifying the normal.dot file (Word's preference file)
You set default fonts the same way as previously.
Click on "Format" then "Font..." then select the font and size that you want to be the default and then press the "Default" button at the lower left of the screen.
And yes, it's in the help files.
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nec timeo nec sperno
I have done all the things listed here to try to get Word 2008 to load correctly. It does load in another new user but not in my normal user.. ugh! I wouldn't use Microsoft tools if it wasn't needed but we need to. So I am stuck, migrate to a new user, this user is years old, or try to continue to determine the cause of the issue. Once again Microsoft sends a product out for us to test.
I did NOT install Entourage, and I'm not involved in any Exchange -related functions -- just standalone Office Apps. It's BEAUTIFUL!
The Word 2008 Installer does NOT delete your Office 2004 installations by default! You must click a checkbox to select which "old" installation should be deleted. I didn't check it and, when I clicked "Finish", my old 204 installation was still there (and still works fine).
Since my issues with word 2008 have nearly all disappeared.
I am still seeing the header and footer issues with crashing.
Hopefully microsoft will send out a fix rather quickly.
I am on a iMac G5 1.8 with 2 gig ram
"Not unexpectedly, by default it deletes the previous installation; in my case, Office 2004. "
Not true, deleting prior Office versions was not a default, it was an option that requires a manual block selection. Even with that option, it just puts the Old Office in the Trash. You can just put it back in the Applications folder, if you change your mind.
I spent an hour on the phone with Microsoft, they put me on hold and talked to Apple and then they suggested deleting all of the com.microsoft...... files from the User/library/Preferences folder and also deleting the "Microsoft" folder inside of the "Preferences" folder.
That absolutely fixed the "Word" crashing problem, for me. Afterwards I was even able to run Word 2004 and Word 2008 at the same time.
iMac Intel Core 2 Duo 2.16 - Leopard 10.5.1
No way to avoid Word from crashing: .plist, different user,font... in my case the crash is due to a framework inside Office=
"imac-xxxxxxxxxx:~ xxxxx /Applications/Microsoft\ Office\ 2008/Office/PowerPlant.framework/Versions/12/Resources/libSystem.B.dylib ; exit;
Illegal instruction"
Incompatibility with something? Btw, installed on my backup partition with Tiger 10.4.11, everything works perfectly!
They came up with my previous given solution after they had me create a new user and Word opened without crashing.
You have to delete all of the com.microsoft... files and the Microsoft folder. Yea the error message talked about exceptions, frameworks, etc.
Not true, deleting prior Office versions was not a default, it was an option that requires a manual block selection. Even with that option, it just puts the Old Office in the Trash. You can just put it back in the Applications folder, if you change your mind.
I spent an hour on the phone with Microsoft, they put me on hold and talked to Apple and then they suggested deleting all of the com.microsoft...... files from the User/library/Preferences folder and also deleting the "Microsoft" folder inside of the "Preferences" folder.
That absolutely fixed the "Word" crashing problem, for me. Afterwards I was even able to run Word 2004 and Word 2008 at the same time.
Just can't see why people keep on working with MS Office.
I use NeoOffice. Works like a charm. Most menus are as I know and expect, rather than the new clumsy user interface, MS has come up with to make Office "easier to use". The NeoOffice spreadsheet even fixes the idiosyncrasies of Excel, so that copy/paste works the way you'd expect (and need) rather than the obscure behaviour of Excel.
PS - sorry this is a bit off-topic. Just sick and tired of reading about yet another new bloated Office version, that leaves users UNproductive, until you've figured out the sick new approaches they have adopted for functions, you knew very well how to perfom.
Office 2008 by default offers to delete Office 2004, but commenters are right, you have to check a box to make it happen.
I tried deleting ALL com.microsoft prefs, and the Microsoft folder in Preferences, restarted Word and it came up ok ... UNTIL I resized the window, then back to crashing.
So it absolutely let me recover, but hasn't fixed what seems to be the root cause for me, Word's inability to persist after the main window is resized and Word is restarted.
It does mark the boxes for you to delete these previous copies of Office but you need to click on "continue" to delete those files. I select not delete those files and my Office 10.* is still there. I had no problems with my install and I can open my old Word, Excel and PowerPoint open with Office 2008. I only had this for one day so I need to do some more testing before I can say anything about Office 2008 being stable.
It worked for me, but the strange thing is I had the problem on my dual g5 tower but my g4 laptop install was fine.
- by Bud Clark January 17, 2008 4:31 PM PST
- Office 2008 by default offers to delete Office 2004, but commenters are right, you have to check a box to make it happen.
- Like this Reply to this comment
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (31 Comments)I tried deleting ALL com.microsoft prefs, and the Microsoft folder in Preferences, restarted Word and it came up ok ... UNTIL I resized the window, then back to crashing.
So it absolutely let me recover, but hasn't fixed what seems to be the root cause for me, Word's inability to persist after the main window is resized and Word is restarted.