Copy/Paste causes Word 2003 to crash... is there an actual fix?

[spdrcr5]

I have been having this issue for a long time. I thought it was my machine
at first, then I thought it was another application that I was running called
SnagIt. But the program and the machine was not at fault. Here's a little
background on why I can say this with 100% confidence.

I work at a Fortune 400 company in the IS Dept. I have access to as many
computers as I need. I have had issues with every single machine I have
tried working on. I have used our Corp image as well as done CD installs of
both XP Pro and Office 2003 Pro, same results every time. I have used both
desktops and laptops. The hardware is both single and duo core, anywhere
from 1-4gb of ram, etc.

I am running XP Pro SP2, it did this with SP1 as well as SP3, but I am
happier running SP2 at the moment.

Office has been SP1, SP2 and SP3 (current). It is fully updated with every
patch known to mankind (Microsoft).

I have done this on a barebones install; XP and Office 2003. no patches, no
other apps. then i installed patches and nothing else... still crashed.

I copy text and images from one Word doc to another Word doc. Word just
shuts down and needs to restart after I do this. I HAVE to do this, it is
part of what I do. I am in the Knowledge Manager/Admin for my company. I
write documentation all day long, edit docs, etc that others submit to me.
I use Word because there isn't anything else.

The errors that I see in Event Viewer are as follows:
Event Type: Error
Event Source: Microsoft Office 11
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1000
Date: 02/18/2009
Time: 11:19:22 AM
User: N/A
Computer: EL054923
Description:
Faulting application winword.exe, version 11.0.8237.0, stamp 48eff681,
faulting module mso.dll, version 11.0.8221.0, stamp 483c699a, debug? 0, fault
address 0x0004637e.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 41 00 70 00 70 00 6c 00 A.p.p.l.
0008: 69 00 63 00 61 00 74 00 i.c.a.t.
0010: 69 00 6f 00 6e 00 20 00 i.o.n. .
0018: 46 00 61 00 69 00 6c 00 F.a.i.l.
0020: 75 00 72 00 65 00 20 00 u.r.e. .
0028: 20 00 77 00 69 00 6e 00 .w.i.n.
0030: 77 00 6f 00 72 00 64 00 w.o.r.d.
0038: 2e 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 ..e.x.e.
0040: 20 00 31 00 31 00 2e 00 .1.1...
0048: 30 00 2e 00 38 00 32 00 0...8.2.
0050: 33 00 37 00 2e 00 30 00 3.7...0.
0058: 20 00 34 00 38 00 65 00 .4.8.e.
0060: 66 00 66 00 36 00 38 00 f.f.6.8.
0068: 31 00 20 00 69 00 6e 00 1. .i.n.
0070: 20 00 6d 00 73 00 6f 00 .m.s.o.
0078: 2e 00 64 00 6c 00 6c 00 ..d.l.l.
0080: 20 00 31 00 31 00 2e 00 .1.1...
0088: 30 00 2e 00 38 00 32 00 0...8.2.
0090: 32 00 31 00 2e 00 30 00 2.1...0.
0098: 20 00 34 00 38 00 33 00 .4.8.3.
00a0: 63 00 36 00 39 00 39 00 c.6.9.9.
00a8: 61 00 20 00 66 00 44 00 a. .f.D.
00b0: 65 00 62 00 75 00 67 00 e.b.u.g.
00b8: 20 00 30 00 20 00 61 00 .0. .a.
00c0: 74 00 20 00 6f 00 66 00 t. .o.f.
00c8: 66 00 73 00 65 00 74 00 f.s.e.t.
00d0: 20 00 30 00 30 00 30 00 .0.0.0.
00d8: 34 00 36 00 33 00 37 00 4.6.3.7.
00e0: 65 00 0d 00 0a 00 e.....

the second error that always follows is:

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Application Hang
Event Category: (101)
Event ID: 1002
Date: 02/18/2009
Time: 11:19:34 AM
User: N/A
Computer: EL054923
Description:
Hanging application WINWORD.EXE, version 11.0.8237.0, hang module hungapp,
version 0.0.0.0, hang address 0x00000000.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 41 70 70 6c 69 63 61 74 Applicat
0008: 69 6f 6e 20 48 61 6e 67 ion Hang
0010: 20 20 57 49 4e 57 4f 52 WINWOR
0018: 44 2e 45 58 45 20 31 31 D.EXE 11
0020: 2e 30 2e 38 32 33 37 2e .0.8237.
0028: 30 20 69 6e 20 68 75 6e 0 in hun
0030: 67 61 70 70 20 30 2e 30 gapp 0.0
0038: 2e 30 2e 30 20 61 74 20 .0.0 at
0040: 6f 66 66 73 65 74 20 30 offset 0
0048: 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 0000000

What is causing this, why can't Microsoft fix this? I am more than willing
to do whatever it takes to get this working. I do NOT have this issue at all
when using Office 2008 on my Mac... so it can be fixed!

Thanks.

Larry

 

[Terry Farrell]

After all those crashes, make sure to clean out the temp folder: with all
applications closed, it should be empty - make it so.

Then I suspect from your description that your problem may be associated
with printer driver(s). Word must be able to see a compatible, locally
installed printer driver set as the Windows Default. I suggest that
eliminate all the networked printers by deleting them all and test with just
one local printer.

 

[spdrcr5]

Terry:

Thanks for the reply, but temp and printer drivers are not the issue at all.
I have had this happen on brand new installs... meaning nothing else was
done with the machine, so there were no temp files. I have had this happen
both on and off the network as well as with and without network, local or no
printers at all.

Larry

 

[Terry Farrell]

How does that prove it isn't a network printer driver causing the problems?

If it isn't the printer, then the other common cause is a third party
utility messing with the Office Clipboard. If you start Word in Safe Mode,
are you able to copy/paste correctly?

From Start, Run (Winkey+R), type in

winword /a

and press enter. Now open 2 documents and test copy/paste.

Terry

 

[Van]

I have been having the exact same thing happen to me for a long, long time.
Using Windows XP Pro and Office 2003, both with all current SPs and updates.
I always let it send an error report, so the data should be available to MS
to allow a fix. As for a supposed requirement that a local printer attached,
it is beyond belief that the absence of an attached printer would/could have
such an impact on Word.

 

[Terry Farrell]

Why is it beyond belief? Word has (always) needed a printer driver as it is
a page layout processor. Word needs to read the printer's parameters in
order to layout the document to looks like the printed output (WYSIWYG).
Every printer (and printer driver) provides slightly different parameters
which is why moving complex documents from one PC to another that uses a
different printer (driver) may result in a slightly different layout (page
length/pagination being one obvious change) and is why Word repaginates
before printing.

Note that you don't actually have to have a printer connected: Word only
needs to see the local printer driver. Setting the standard XPS or DIW
drivers as the default printer or installing the Windows Generic Text driver
is sufficient for Word to work. With some networked printer setups or
wireless printer setups, the bidirectional printer communication doesn't
work correctly resulting in Word failing to work.

Terry

 

[spdrcr5]

Terry:

I didn't say it proved it wasn't a network printer... I said it was a
PRINTER driver issue at all. Just as I have stated it isn't any interference
from anything outside of XP or Office itself.

I have been having this issue going on 2 yrs now. Been hoping that one of
these days one of the many patches or SPs might actually fix this issue. I
got fed up and decided to post on here.

For some reason instead of thinking that it could quite possibly be Word
itself you are looking to place blame at the feet of something else.

Word is not trying to repaginate or do anything else when it is locking
up/crashing. If you're about to ask me how I know this... its quite simple.
I have had Word literally lock up within microseconds of my having hit the
ctrl+v on my keyboard. Word is not trying to repaginate because I had not
even had a chance to save my work.

Also as I had already clearly stated regarding the printer drivers. I have
tried this with local, network as well as no printer drivers installed. That
to me also rules out the printer driver as being at fault.

I stopped sending the errors back to Microsoft because after 1,000+ crashes
of the same exact thing on more than 10 different machines I got tired of it.
Now I don't even wait for Word to recover on it's own, I just shut Word down
and then it reopens quicker. But it still recovers from the crash.

I am not trying to be an a*hole, but this is extremely frustrating. I know
fully well how to troubleshoot an issue. I have in the past discovered
several bugs in previous versions of Word going back to Word 2.0 and 6.0. I
also know I am not the only person with this major issue with Word.

What sort of thing is Microsoft actually doing internally to try and resolve
this issue?

Larry

 

[Beth Melton]

Well....yes and no. If there is absolutely no printer Word will use an
internal driver/viewer/something. BUT if a printer is installed and the
printer driver is unavailable or corrupt then that's when things go awry.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP
https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Melton
What is a Microsoft MVP? http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/gp/mvpfaqs

Guides for the Office 2007 Interface:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/training/HA102295841033.aspx

 

[Beth Melton]

They best way to determine if where the issue actually lies is to start Word
in Safe Mode and see if the issue still occurs. Hold your Ctrl key while
starting Word. Continue holding it until you're prompted to start in Safe
Mode.

Also, does it crash if you click Paste or only if you use Ctrl+V?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP
https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Melton
What is a Microsoft MVP? http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/gp/mvpfaqs

Guides for the Office 2007 Interface:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/training/HA102295841033.aspx

 

[Terry Farrell]

I already asked that Beth, but it was ignored.

Terry

 

[spdrcr5]

Beth:

It doesn't matter if I use ctrl+v or click the paste icon or even right
click and paste. All give the same results. But it doesn't mean it
locks/crashes every single time.

Terry, your suggestion to try Word in Safe Mode was made after I had already
left for the day and couldn't give it a test. I am back at work and plan on
trying Word in safe mode. I will post my results as soon as I have something
to post.

Thanks.

Larry

 

[Terry Farrell]

Thanks.

Terry

Beth:

It doesn't matter if I use ctrl+v or click the paste icon or even right
click and paste. All give the same results. But it doesn't mean it
locks/crashes every single time.

Terry, your suggestion to try Word in Safe Mode was made after I had
already
left for the day and couldn't give it a test. I am back at work and plan
on
trying Word in safe mode. I will post my results as soon as I have
something
to post.

Thanks.

Larry

 

[robgbne]

Why is it beyond belief?

Because Word should work independently of printer drivers until it
needs to send something to the printer. In any case, a printer driver
should never be allowed to interfere with the operation of the
application for anything other than printing.

Word has (always) needed a printer driver as it is
a page layout processor.

I am currently using Word 2003 with no printer drivers installed and
no printers configured (the printers and faxes control panel is
completely empty) and yet Word works just fine - it will even do print
preview. All it needs for that is some information regarding page
setup, and if the user hasn’t entered any, it will use its defaults.

Word may install and use a default driver, if that is the cause of the
OP’s issue then it is still a problem with Word.

Word needs to read the printer's parameters in
order to layout the document to looks like the printed output (WYSIWYG).

If that is so, then it is a fault with Word. Printer parameters
should be totally independent of page layout, I can create an A3
layout without an A3 capable printer (or with no printer configured at
all). That is inconsistent with your theory.

Every printer (and printer driver) provides slightly different parameters
which is why moving complex documents from one PC to another that uses a
different printer (driver) may result in a slightly different layout (page
length/pagination being one obvious change) and is why Word repaginates
before printing.

There are many reasons for repaginating, why would one reason have any
more consequences than any other? Even if the above is true, how is
it relevant to copying and pasting?

Note that you don't actually have to have a printer connected: Word only
needs to see the local printer driver.

It can’t see any drivers on my machine unless it decided to install
and find one itself. If it’s done that, it’s Word’s problem.

Setting the standard XPS or DIW
drivers as the default printer or installing the Windows Generic Text driver
is sufficient for Word to work. With some networked printer setups or
wireless printer setups, the bidirectional printer communication doesn't
work correctly resulting in Word failing to work.

Presumably that occurs during the act of printing and is irrelevant to
issues regarding copy and paste.

 

[Terry Farrell]

It's been pointed out to me that Word will actually work without a printer
driver. The problems start if there is a printer driver that is either
incompatible, corrupt or Word cannot communicate with it. With no printer
driver installed, it will use its defaults. So what you are doing without a
printer driver is correct. Because you don't have a printer, you can use any
paper size you like (up to 24"), but once you install a printer driver, the
only pages displayed will be those that your printer (or the driver )
decides is compatible with the printer. Sometimes printer drivers are wrong
though and how it responds to the user forcing an incompatible size depends
on the printer/driver.

Of all the PCs I've had to support, problems with copy/paste have always
been down to the temp folder being full of abandoned files or a third party
utility interfering with the Office clipboard.

Terry

Why is it beyond belief?

Because Word should work independently of printer drivers until it
needs to send something to the printer. In any case, a printer driver
should never be allowed to interfere with the operation of the
application for anything other than printing.

Word has (always) needed a printer driver as it is
a page layout processor.

I am currently using Word 2003 with no printer drivers installed and
no printers configured (the printers and faxes control panel is
completely empty) and yet Word works just fine - it will even do print
preview. All it needs for that is some information regarding page
setup, and if the user hasn’t entered any, it will use its defaults.

Word may install and use a default driver, if that is the cause of the
OP’s issue then it is still a problem with Word.

Word needs to read the printer's parameters in
order to layout the document to looks like the printed output (WYSIWYG).

If that is so, then it is a fault with Word. Printer parameters
should be totally independent of page layout, I can create an A3
layout without an A3 capable printer (or with no printer configured at
all). That is inconsistent with your theory.

Every printer (and printer driver) provides slightly different parameters
which is why moving complex documents from one PC to another that uses a
different printer (driver) may result in a slightly different layout (page
length/pagination being one obvious change) and is why Word repaginates
before printing.

There are many reasons for repaginating, why would one reason have any
more consequences than any other? Even if the above is true, how is
it relevant to copying and pasting?

Note that you don't actually have to have a printer connected: Word only
needs to see the local printer driver.

It can’t see any drivers on my machine unless it decided to install
and find one itself. If it’s done that, it’s Word’s problem.

Setting the standard XPS or DIW
drivers as the default printer or installing the Windows Generic Text
driver
is sufficient for Word to work. With some networked printer setups or
wireless printer setups, the bidirectional printer communication doesn't
work correctly resulting in Word failing to work.

Presumably that occurs during the act of printing and is irrelevant to
issues regarding copy and paste.

 

[spdrcr5]

I wanted to give an update as to where things stand.

I tried Word in Safe Mode. It still crashed, just not as often.

Terry, for some reason you keep thinking that the issue has to either be
printer driver related or a third party application interfering with the
clipboard. I read all of the posts in this thread and won't rehash the
printer driver issue. What I have to ask is about the clipboard issue.

How could there be any sort of interference with the clipboard from a 3rd
party application when nothing else is installed on some of these machines
that I have worked on other than WinXP Pro and Office 2003 Pro? I am 100%
serious about this. I have access to as many computers as I can ever need
and have built them using both our Corp image as well as an OEM CD for XP. I
have done barebones installs, etc. I have still had these issues.

I know there has to be a bug within Word itself that is causing this. The
next step I will be doing very, very reluctantly will be to try this out
using Office 2007. I can't use that on my production machine, but will set
something up as a test. That could take me a little while to get setup
though.

In the mean time, what else could possibly be tried? I can't use Word in
Safe Mode for fewer crashes, it isn't how Word should be used.

I am not ignoring any replies, going on vacation until Wed.

Thanks.

Larry

 

[Terry Farrell]

Yes, safe mode is only for diagnostics - but even if only occasionally, it
shouldn't crash at all. Safe mode eliminates just about everything except
Word. But I've never seen this problem before. Even the event log is
unhelpful!

Are all the workstations identical? Do they all experience the same problem?

Terry

 

[Beth Melton]

I wanted to give an update as to where things stand.

I tried Word in Safe Mode. It still crashed, just not as often.

While Safe Mode helps rule out your Word installation and since it still
crashes it does imply a Word issue but in this case I don't think it is. I
suspect there's some type of conflict with Word and something on your system
or something that each system you've tried this on have in common. Here's my
thoughts on why I don't think this is a Word issue (of course I'm not ruling
out the possibility that I could be wrong - you never do that. ;-) ):

1) Microsoft has found Paste is the most frequently used command. If a there
were a major issue then they (and we) would hear about it a LOT.

2) Whenever those in the newsgroups have encountered Word (or another Office
app) crashing when using Paste some type of a conflict was found rather than
a bug in the application.

3) If it crashes when you paste simple text, such as a Word or two in the
same document, essentially all the application does is retrieve content from
the Windows Clipboard. Now, if you are copy/pasting between Word documents
or the data you are pasting comes from another source then there's a little
more involved and you could be encountering a bug in Word due to a conflict
between the programs you are using and there are some known bugs in this
area. That is, Word crashes when the source of the data is from another
application and it only occurs with that application.

Can you tell me if it happens when you copy/paste a few words in the same
document? If not, then what is the source of the data you are copying?

I don't think you should try using Office 2007 just yet. If it's happened in
other versions of Word then I suspect you'll encounter the same. Instead,
have you tried seeing if the issue occurs when you start Windows in Safe
Mode? That will help rule out a few items. Also, do you have an permissions
set on the the Windows temp folder and is there a valid temp folder? What
about the folder the files are in or the hard drive? Any restrictions or
permissions assigned? What virus scanning software do you use?
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP
https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Melton
What is a Microsoft MVP? http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/gp/mvpfaqs

Guides for the Office 2007 Interface:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/training/HA102295841033.aspx

 

[Terry Farrell]

Another thought I have had is that I wonder is there is possibly a conflict
of styles. If the PCs are set up so that the Paste default is the 'Keep
Source Formatting' whilst the copied paragraphs are using the same style
name using different settings (if you follow my drift). This would cause a
conflict and the keep track of formatting would spawn new styles on the fly.

My other thought is that maybe the style is taking on the destination style
and maybe there's a graphics driver error. But that would only happen if all
the PCs are using the same hardware, of course.

But I am fairly convinced that this is something quite abnormal to Word and
must be an outside influence.

Terry

 

[spdrcr5]

I wanted to give another update on this.

I went through and checked every possible add-on and found a few. There were
two COM Add-Ins, one from Verisign and the other from Microsoft. I removed
them both. I then uninstalled Adobe Acrobat which was adding in the PDF
Creator stuff. The last thing I did was to delete my Normal.dot file and
allow it to be recreated.

After the above was all done I rebooted and allowed the Normal.dot to be
created. I then rebooted again just for the hell of it.

None of the above made a bit of difference, I am still crashing just as much
as when this stuff was installed.

I am getting another laptop today or tomorrow and will see how that works.

Larry

 

[njonsey]

Hello All,
I am having a similar issue. when I create a new word document and save it.
It saves fine, but once I close word I get the pop up and word tries to
recove my document. the event log shows
Faulting application winword.exe, version 11.0.8237.0, stamp 48eff681,
faulting module winword.exe, version 11.0.8237.0, stamp 48eff681, debug? 0,
fault address 0x00074c
04. event code 1000

I am running Office 2003 Pro on Win2k Pro SP4.

Note: This is happening on an End user pc under her profile. When I log on
with my profile I do not have an issue. I have several Networked Printers
installed. same as the end user.