Office & productivity software forum: 2 Problems with Excel 2007

I ran into that and it was a pending install. I removed the pending install with a tool from Microsoft (use google to find this) called the Microsoft Installer Cleanup Tool.

My second thought is to uninstall Office and install it again and be sure that no feature is set to install on demand.
Bob

It did find errors and allthough the tool is free the repair is not. I have to register the software to run the fix, surely there is something else I can do without making another investment. I am going to hold off on the reinstall for now until I get some more feedback.

The exact error I get is: Excel found unreadable content in <filename.xlsx> Do you want to recover the contents of the workbook? If you trust the source of this workbook then click yes. I have a yes or no to click. If I click yes I get This file cannot be opened by Microsoft Excel. Do you want to search the Misrosoft online website for a converter that can open the file. This time my options are yes, no, and cancel. I usually get this window twice. The problem with saving in Excel97-2003 format is I get the loss of fidelity warning. My data is ok and my formulas seem to work the same. I think this was how I got around it before by working in the older format. I might try the tool suggested so far or the reinstall.

I use Excel 2007 Office home and student and I understand what you are saying because when I try to save in the 97-03 format I have a loss of fidelity issue. However this appears to be my only workaround otherwise I lose data. They are still opening in 2007 format and so far I have been able to copy the missing portions from either the backup on the hard drive (as I said earlier I store them on a USB flash drive) or by opening the 97-03 format. I do not want to save a file to my flash drive, hard drive, and hard drive in 97-03 format every time I go to exit an Excel file as that can be a pain, but I also do not want to lose my data. I have a spreadsheet as a checkbook register and several for my budget and I could lose a week, month, or maybe more of data I can not recreate. I have a "paper trail" but the information I have is only good for the current month and if I have to go back any further than that I can't. Also I can not recreate cash transactions as I have no paper trail for those. I need a fix that I can do without investing more money.

I have Office 2007 on both my desktop and laptop. I only have 3 maybe 4 workbooks that I created prior to upgrading to Office 2007. There are several workbooks I have created with the new version and did not save backwards until I got the error and lost the data. I'm not sure if I understand you correctly, so if I am redundant I appologize. When I bought my latest PC it came with Office Home and Student 2007. I had the workbooks I created in Excel97 and clicked on convert with Excel 2007, made some more, started getting the error and losing my data. Was able to recreate or partially recreate the data, but saved the files in 97-03 format. Created more new sheets using Excel 2007, noticed no error, so I converted the 97 files again. Worked fine for months, now the same error is back. The only formatiing I do is either date or currency for the most part. I only have a few linked.

The problem with the MSI error didn't come until just recently and I had been working for months and didn't do anything special. I will try you second solution for my more difficult problem.

Those demo versions do that. It's really simple to figure out if you own your copy of Office by looking at the hole in your wallet.
Bob

I got the same issue with Excel not being able to read the contents of the file and since I thought I had the problem solved by changing my trust options, I have not been backing up all my excel files, just the one I use most often for my finance which I usually backup once a week. This time both files were in unlinked workbooks. Both files were created by me. One I think was saved in 97-03 format from when I had the problem before, the other one was never saved in 97-03 format. I have an error with another software where they had me go into my registy and fix some things. I followed their advice and lost my DSL and anti-virus. I had to use a restore point prior to the changes. I did the registy work on 11/23/10 and finally restored successfully to 11/17/10. Both of the files I have had the issue with have been open without the error. I haven't done anything different since I did the restore and now the error is back. I don't know if that was important, just thought you might want to know. I haven't had the issue on my laptop with the unreadable content, in fact to my best memory I have only had the problem once or twice. Both my laptop and desktop have Office 2007. Both have McAfee anti-virus. My desktop is windows Vista home (current on service packs and updates), my laptop is WindowsXPsp3 and is not connected to the internet and is not current on updates. I never changed the trust options on my laptop, but I did reinstall Office 2007 to resolve that setup issue I had. The files that Excel says are unreadable are on a flash (USB) drive. I don't know what other information I can give you, I do know is I need help to fix it from people that know more than I do.