Corrupted file

[Jonny]

I have this rather large workbook which contains masses
of code (separately backed up) and many hours of
formatting work and the file keeps getting corrupted. I
have back ups but running the update takes several hours
and to keep finding the the file is corrupted is
incredibly annoying, the only way I've found to recover
this is by using third party software which costs money
which I shouldn't have to spend as we've already payed
Microsoft enough money for the software in the first
place. Does anybody have any ideas, or tips to reduce the
chances of corruption or links to freeware recovery
software.
Any help greatly appreciated

 

[Jan Karel Pieterse]

Hi Jonny,

I have this rather large workbook which contains masses
of code (separately backed up) and many hours of
formatting work and the file keeps getting corrupted.

Some general remarks first:

Options to try and open a corrupt file

- Set calculation to manual
- open the file, but disable macros (assuming you've set macro security
to medium: Tools, Macro, security)
- As soon as you've clicked the disable macros button, press
control-pageup or control-pagedown, thus changing sheets.

If that does not work, try creating a link to the file:

='c:\my documents\[MyFileName.xls]Sheet1'!A1

and copy right and down. This at least gets you the worksheets values.

if you don't know the sheet names, enter this:

='C:\PathToFile\[MyFileName.xls]'!A1

and press enter

If XL (2000) is able to extract them, it will prompt you for a sheet
name.

Sometimes the Excel viewer, Word or even Internet explorer (v5) enables
you to open the file and copy information out of it.

If the file is not protected, maybe you can open it with OpenOffice
(www.Openoffice.org).

Also, Excel XP can sometimes repair XL files with trouble.

Finally, sometimes a corrupt file that still can be opened,
can be cured using this method (XL2000 or up):

- Open the file
- Save-as filetype Webpage
- close the file
- Open the html file
- save-as normal Excel workbook.

Another thing to do is to start using the code cleaner by Rob Bovey,
find it at www.bmsltd.co.uk/mvp

Regards,

Jan Karel Pieterse
Excel MVP
www.jkp-ads.com