Ask Me Help Desk

Ask Me Help Desk (https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/forum.php)
-   Freeware & Shareware (https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/forumdisplay.php?f=390)
-   -   Freeware to repair an Excel file (https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/showthread.php?t=351225)

  • May 8, 2009, 04:14 AM
    carroll99
    Freeware to repair an Excel file
    I need freeware to repair an excel file.
    Thanks
  • May 8, 2009, 04:48 AM
    NeedKarma
    Excel files rarely need "repair" so you're unlikely to find any. What is wrong with the file?
    BTW I have some expertise in finding freeware/open source version of many apps.
  • May 8, 2009, 04:59 AM
    carroll99
    Thanks for the reply
    The file loads OK, but any changes take about 30 sec - drag a cell to another location and the hourglass is on the screen for 30 sec. I did an excel "file open/repair" and got the message that the file was repaired - some conditional format data was removed. However, this did not solve the problem.
  • May 8, 2009, 05:12 AM
    NeedKarma
    Have you tried opening the file on another computer and making some changes there? The issue could be with either your PC or your version of Excel.
  • May 8, 2009, 08:20 PM
    carroll99
    NeedKarma,
    Thanks for your help. I finally solved the problem by saving the Excel file as a .SYLK
    File and then saving back as an Excel file. I had to do a little format work, but the file
    Is no longer corrupted and works fine. This "SYLK" solution came from a Microsoft forum.
    Carroll
  • May 9, 2009, 11:31 AM
    JBeaucaire

    I'm going to guess that perhaps you were experiencing worksheet "bloat" which I've seen occasionally, too. The cause seems to be when formatting and conditional formatting gets applied to entire columns and rows... traveling FAR outside your actual work area on your sheets.

    Sometimes, this starts causing the file SIZE to inflate unbelievably, too, further frustrating the matter.

    The simple fix, if this is really what is going on and to keep from losing the formatting/conditional formatting you ARE using, is to highlight all the columns outside your work area and click:

    EDIT > CLEAR > ALL

    Then repeat that with all the rows below your work area.

    My wife recently had an issue at her work, a file she used daily had suddenly bloomed up to 15mg in size and was taking forever to do things. We did the trick above and the file size dropped to 72k.

    Egads.
  • May 9, 2009, 07:05 PM
    carroll99
    Thanks for your help. For whatever reason, your suggestion didn't help, but thanks for
    Trying to help.
    Carroll
  • May 9, 2009, 11:40 PM
    JBeaucaire

    Bummer, well, hopefully it will come in handy when it does happen to you.

  • All times are GMT -7. The time now is 03:54 AM.