Excel 2007 very slow to open even the simplest worksheet

[John]

I have worksheets that only have from 1 to 7 rows and Excel 2007 takes
anywhere from 30 to 60 seconds to open these worksheets. I am running
Windows XP SP2
on a IBM/Lenova with 1 Gig of ram and a 3 Ghz processor.

Is there any setting I can change (or turn off) to speed this muther up?

 

[Martin von Gagern]

Does http://martin.von-gagern.net/howtos/excel2007load help?
I wrote about this in another thread here, but I know many people only
monitor their own thread. Sorry for the duplicate to everyone else.

 

[Rob]

Hi Martin,

I tried that solution but did not make any difference. Maybe I didn't
follow the procedure exactly. The instructions that were given I have
produced below as they are a bit confusing.....
Application for this operation:
At the end of the line, replace /e with "%1"

Does that mean I remove the / (the forward slash) and the e, and add "%1"
including the quotation marks?

DDE-Application not active:
Insert new text: [rem see command line]
Do I include the [ and the ] brackets?

Rob

 

[John]

Rob,

Martins solution works great! Thanks Martin. The "Application to Perform
Action" should look like:

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\EXCEL.EXE" "%1"

Hi Martin,

I tried that solution but did not make any difference. Maybe I didn't
follow the procedure exactly. The instructions that were given I have
produced below as they are a bit confusing.....
Application for this operation:
At the end of the line, replace /e with "%1"

Does that mean I remove the / (the forward slash) and the e, and add "%1"
including the quotation marks?

DDE-Application not active:
Insert new text: [rem see command line]
Do I include the [ and the ] brackets?

Rob

Does http://martin.von-gagern.net/howtos/excel2007load help?
I wrote about this in another thread here, but I know many people only
monitor their own thread. Sorry for the duplicate to everyone else.

 

[Martin von Gagern]

Hi Rob!

Yes, remove / and e, add "%1" including quotes, and the [ ] brackets in
[rem see command line] are to be included as well. Maybe I'll formulate
this more clearly.

So if this did not solve the issue for you, you can try some
intermediate steps I tried while examining this problem.
1. Double-click an Excel document while another is already open
2. Start Excel from the start menu, then double-click a document
3. Start Excel and open the document using the open dialog
4. Remove the [rem ...] and open a document

All these solutions resulted in the file being opened quickly for me.
4. however caused the document to be opened again when closing Excel, or
in an error message from Explorer, at least in some cases.

If all of these approaches fail, then it looks like your Excel is really
busy loading the file. Have a look at the Task Manager's process list to
see whether Excel or the idle process consume more CPU. I always had the
system idle while waiting that minute.

Let's see if we can get this solved for you as well...

Martin

Hi Martin,

I tried that solution but did not make any difference. Maybe I didn't
follow the procedure exactly. The instructions that were given I have
produced below as they are a bit confusing.....
Application for this operation:
At the end of the line, replace /e with "%1"

Does that mean I remove the / (the forward slash) and the e, and add "%1"
including the quotation marks?

DDE-Application not active:
Insert new text: [rem see command line]
Do I include the [ and the ] brackets?

Rob

Does http://martin.von-gagern.net/howtos/excel2007load help?
I wrote about this in another thread here, but I know many people only
monitor their own thread. Sorry for the duplicate to everyone else.

 

[Rob]

Thanks John for your input.

Rob

Rob,

Martins solution works great! Thanks Martin. The "Application to Perform
Action" should look like:

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\EXCEL.EXE" "%1"

Hi Martin,

I tried that solution but did not make any difference. Maybe I didn't
follow the procedure exactly. The instructions that were given I have
produced below as they are a bit confusing.....
Application for this operation:
At the end of the line, replace /e with "%1"

Does that mean I remove the / (the forward slash) and the e, and add
"%1"
including the quotation marks?

DDE-Application not active:
Insert new text: [rem see command line]
Do I include the [ and the ] brackets?

Rob

Does http://martin.von-gagern.net/howtos/excel2007load help?
I wrote about this in another thread here, but I know many people only
monitor their own thread. Sorry for the duplicate to everyone else.

John wrote:
I have worksheets that only have from 1 to 7 rows and Excel 2007 takes
anywhere from 30 to 60 seconds to open these worksheets. I am running
Windows XP SP2
on a IBM/Lenova with 1 Gig of ram and a 3 Ghz processor.

Is there any setting I can change (or turn off) to speed this muther
up?

 

[Rob]

Hi Martin,

I had done it that way so nothing to try other than your further
suggestions.

However, I was having some other problems with macro security. I had made My
Documents and its sub folders trusted and when I removed that from the trust
centre the files opened as they should by double clicking, albeit more
slowly.
In fact, on my system and from reading others' complaints, any xlsm files
open slower AND macros act slower AND calculations are slower than their xls
counterpart. It seems leaving the files as xls is the way to go for some.

What has Microsoft accomplished with this version? I think a backward and
confusing program for sure!!

Is this program more suited to those running dual processors?

Rob

Hi Rob!

Yes, remove / and e, add "%1" including quotes, and the [ ] brackets in
[rem see command line] are to be included as well. Maybe I'll formulate
this more clearly.

So if this did not solve the issue for you, you can try some
intermediate steps I tried while examining this problem.
1. Double-click an Excel document while another is already open
2. Start Excel from the start menu, then double-click a document
3. Start Excel and open the document using the open dialog
4. Remove the [rem ...] and open a document

All these solutions resulted in the file being opened quickly for me.
4. however caused the document to be opened again when closing Excel, or
in an error message from Explorer, at least in some cases.

If all of these approaches fail, then it looks like your Excel is really
busy loading the file. Have a look at the Task Manager's process list to
see whether Excel or the idle process consume more CPU. I always had the
system idle while waiting that minute.

Let's see if we can get this solved for you as well...

Martin

Hi Martin,

I tried that solution but did not make any difference. Maybe I didn't
follow the procedure exactly. The instructions that were given I have
produced below as they are a bit confusing.....
Application for this operation:
At the end of the line, replace /e with "%1"

Does that mean I remove the / (the forward slash) and the e, and add
"%1"
including the quotation marks?

DDE-Application not active:
Insert new text: [rem see command line]
Do I include the [ and the ] brackets?

Rob

Does http://martin.von-gagern.net/howtos/excel2007load help?
I wrote about this in another thread here, but I know many people only
monitor their own thread. Sorry for the duplicate to everyone else.

John wrote:
I have worksheets that only have from 1 to 7 rows and Excel 2007 takes
anywhere from 30 to 60 seconds to open these worksheets. I am running
Windows XP SP2
on a IBM/Lenova with 1 Gig of ram and a 3 Ghz processor.

Is there any setting I can change (or turn off) to speed this muther
up?

 

[Martin von Gagern]

Hi Rob!

So your files had been saved as XSLM? I haven't even looked at those new
extensions so far, and right now I don't have access to that Office
installation. Have you modified the open command for XSLM accordingly,
or did you stick with my instructions literally which only mention XSL?

I used to sign my macros with a simple self signed certificate, which
made macro trust inherent to the file and not dependent on file
location. But of course, the directory based solution seems more simple.

On the whole I am not conviced at all by this new Office version.
1. Things in the toolbar were always accessible by one click.
Now I have to select the right tab first.
2. Seldom used stuff was in the menus and had clear names. Now I only
see symbols, and have to use tooltips to know what they do.
3. Most programs had the same interface based on menus, toolbar, working
area. Now I have to lern new user interface concepts as Office, IE,
Media Player are different from each other and from the whole rest.
4. Applications could be adapted to work with really small screen
resolutions or simply small windows. Judging by the amount of area
those new toolbars consume, you are effectively forced to run in full
screen mode with some not-too-low resolution.

About your suggestion of dual core processors: hello, has the world gone
insane? Office applications are about handling office data, not about
simulating fluid dynamics or rendering 3D movies! They might require
some memory, but should require near to no CPU. But that it should be
like this doesn't make it so, and I fear you might still be right, and
it might be designed for advanced processors simply because it's easy to
waste resources.

For all these reasons, I did not yet update on my notebook and probably
never will. And that's why I can't check about .xslm right now.

Martin

Hi Martin,

I had done it that way so nothing to try other than your further
suggestions.

However, I was having some other problems with macro security. I had made My
Documents and its sub folders trusted and when I removed that from the trust
centre the files opened as they should by double clicking, albeit more
slowly.
In fact, on my system and from reading others' complaints, any xlsm files
open slower AND macros act slower AND calculations are slower than their xls
counterpart. It seems leaving the files as xls is the way to go for some.

What has Microsoft accomplished with this version? I think a backward and
confusing program for sure!!

Is this program more suited to those running dual processors?

Rob

Hi Rob!

Yes, remove / and e, add "%1" including quotes, and the [ ] brackets in
[rem see command line] are to be included as well. Maybe I'll formulate
this more clearly.

So if this did not solve the issue for you, you can try some
intermediate steps I tried while examining this problem.
1. Double-click an Excel document while another is already open
2. Start Excel from the start menu, then double-click a document
3. Start Excel and open the document using the open dialog
4. Remove the [rem ...] and open a document

All these solutions resulted in the file being opened quickly for me.
4. however caused the document to be opened again when closing Excel, or
in an error message from Explorer, at least in some cases.

If all of these approaches fail, then it looks like your Excel is really
busy loading the file. Have a look at the Task Manager's process list to
see whether Excel or the idle process consume more CPU. I always had the
system idle while waiting that minute.

Let's see if we can get this solved for you as well...

Martin

Hi Martin,

I tried that solution but did not make any difference. Maybe I didn't
follow the procedure exactly. The instructions that were given I have
produced below as they are a bit confusing.....
Application for this operation:
At the end of the line, replace /e with "%1"

Does that mean I remove the / (the forward slash) and the e, and add
"%1"
including the quotation marks?

DDE-Application not active:
Insert new text: [rem see command line]
Do I include the [ and the ] brackets?

Rob


Does http://martin.von-gagern.net/howtos/excel2007load help?
I wrote about this in another thread here, but I know many people only
monitor their own thread. Sorry for the duplicate to everyone else.

John wrote:
I have worksheets that only have from 1 to 7 rows and Excel 2007 takes
anywhere from 30 to 60 seconds to open these worksheets. I am running
Windows XP SP2
on a IBM/Lenova with 1 Gig of ram and a 3 Ghz processor.

Is there any setting I can change (or turn off) to speed this muther
up?

 

[Rob]

Thanks for all those comments Martin. I agree wholeheartedly that the 2007
is a pain to use. A lot of changes. Unfortunately I need to keep up with
the version used at my office so I need to learn & use it. The big problem
so far is working through all the workbooks created in an earlier version
and making them work in the new. At my first attempt I nearly stabbed the
computer to death! Boy, the calculating time is unbelievably long.

I would say keep to the older version until the latest has been fixed. Or
maybe 2008 will be a better year.

Rob

Hi Rob!

So your files had been saved as XSLM? I haven't even looked at those new
extensions so far, and right now I don't have access to that Office
installation. Have you modified the open command for XSLM accordingly,
or did you stick with my instructions literally which only mention XSL?

I used to sign my macros with a simple self signed certificate, which
made macro trust inherent to the file and not dependent on file
location. But of course, the directory based solution seems more simple.

On the whole I am not conviced at all by this new Office version.
1. Things in the toolbar were always accessible by one click.
Now I have to select the right tab first.
2. Seldom used stuff was in the menus and had clear names. Now I only
see symbols, and have to use tooltips to know what they do.
3. Most programs had the same interface based on menus, toolbar, working
area. Now I have to lern new user interface concepts as Office, IE,
Media Player are different from each other and from the whole rest.
4. Applications could be adapted to work with really small screen
resolutions or simply small windows. Judging by the amount of area
those new toolbars consume, you are effectively forced to run in full
screen mode with some not-too-low resolution.

About your suggestion of dual core processors: hello, has the world gone
insane? Office applications are about handling office data, not about
simulating fluid dynamics or rendering 3D movies! They might require
some memory, but should require near to no CPU. But that it should be
like this doesn't make it so, and I fear you might still be right, and
it might be designed for advanced processors simply because it's easy to
waste resources.

For all these reasons, I did not yet update on my notebook and probably
never will. And that's why I can't check about .xslm right now.

Martin

Hi Martin,

I had done it that way so nothing to try other than your further
suggestions.

However, I was having some other problems with macro security. I had made
My
Documents and its sub folders trusted and when I removed that from the
trust
centre the files opened as they should by double clicking, albeit more
slowly.
In fact, on my system and from reading others' complaints, any xlsm files
open slower AND macros act slower AND calculations are slower than their
xls
counterpart. It seems leaving the files as xls is the way to go for some.

What has Microsoft accomplished with this version? I think a backward
and
confusing program for sure!!

Is this program more suited to those running dual processors?

Rob

Hi Rob!

Yes, remove / and e, add "%1" including quotes, and the [ ] brackets in
[rem see command line] are to be included as well. Maybe I'll formulate
this more clearly.

So if this did not solve the issue for you, you can try some
intermediate steps I tried while examining this problem.
1. Double-click an Excel document while another is already open
2. Start Excel from the start menu, then double-click a document
3. Start Excel and open the document using the open dialog
4. Remove the [rem ...] and open a document

All these solutions resulted in the file being opened quickly for me.
4. however caused the document to be opened again when closing Excel, or
in an error message from Explorer, at least in some cases.

If all of these approaches fail, then it looks like your Excel is really
busy loading the file. Have a look at the Task Manager's process list to
see whether Excel or the idle process consume more CPU. I always had the
system idle while waiting that minute.

Let's see if we can get this solved for you as well...

Martin

Rob wrote:
Hi Martin,

I tried that solution but did not make any difference. Maybe I didn't
follow the procedure exactly. The instructions that were given I have
produced below as they are a bit confusing.....
Application for this operation:
At the end of the line, replace /e with "%1"

Does that mean I remove the / (the forward slash) and the e, and add
"%1"
including the quotation marks?

DDE-Application not active:
Insert new text: [rem see command line]
Do I include the [ and the ] brackets?

Rob


Does http://martin.von-gagern.net/howtos/excel2007load help?
I wrote about this in another thread here, but I know many people only
monitor their own thread. Sorry for the duplicate to everyone else.

John wrote:
I have worksheets that only have from 1 to 7 rows and Excel 2007
takes
anywhere from 30 to 60 seconds to open these worksheets. I am
running
Windows XP SP2
on a IBM/Lenova with 1 Gig of ram and a 3 Ghz processor.

Is there any setting I can change (or turn off) to speed this muther
up?

 

[SDP]

I don't know why, but minimizing the Excel window after 2 or 3 seconds always
makes my files open - the window will minimize and bounce back open with your
file immediately. I'd love to know why this works.

 

[Martin von Gagern]

Hi SDP!

I can only guess, but I would guess this:

Explorer tries to send a DDE message, finds there is no Excel around to
receive it, starts Excel, immediately sends the DDE message again, finds
Excel is not ready to receive it yet, and decides to wait till excel
becomes available. By some mistake, it does not wake up when excel is
ready, I cannot begin to guess why that might be. Therefore it probably
decides to try again after one minute, and succeeds then. Now if you
press the minimize button and Excel actually changes window state,
Explorer might notice this and decide to try again immediately.

Wild guessing, but I'm pretty sure that DDE has its part in this.

Martin

 

[SDP]

Well, I just used your fix and it works great. The only thing I had to
change was #5: "List item XLS" to "List item XLSX"

Thanks for the fix; it's making me look smart around the office.

 

[SDP]

Well, I just used your fix and it works great. The only thing I had to
change was #5: "List item XLS" to "List item XLSX"

Thanks for the fix; it's making me look smart around the office.

 

[Martin von Gagern]

Congratulations to looking smart.

Now consider how dumb MS looks in this context! After all, it's their
program, their OS, they should have known how to address this issue. ;-)

Martin

 

[CharltonCalhoun]

I had the same [slow opening] issue. Martin's solution worked for me.
Thanks!

 

[robert morris]

Martin,

This is some time later than your post, however I have just started with the
verrry slow opening of 2007 excel spreadsheets. I'm running xp with Office
2007 upgrade.
I searched Discussion groups and found your reply. My problem is; Try as I
may, I cannot locate Menu item FOLDER OPTIONS (forgive the shouting) Could
you possibly start me from the beginning? It appears your fix works for all
who are smarter than me in getting to the right church.

Thanks in advance

Bob

 

[Martin von Gagern]

Hi Robert!

I'm not sure whether this is going to help, but let's start from the
beginning.
1. Klick on the Start menu button in the lower left corner
2. Choose the Applications submenu and look for Windows Explorer
1.+2. Instead of 1. and 2. as described above, you may also press and
hold your Windows key and then press E
3. Now you should see an Explorer window,
and this window should have a menu bar
4. Choose the "Tools" menu
5. Look for anything remotely like "Folder Options"
6. Now you are ready for step 4. of my online instruction

This description can, however, be inaccurate for several reasons.
1. I wrote it down from memory, as I'm usually using Linux and only boot
Windows when I can't avoid to.
2. My Windows is all German, and although I was told that my
translations to english were correct, there might still be an error
there. I have seen a screenshot of the "Folder Options" dialog box,
so that's really its name, but the menu item might be called
differently.
3. This was for Windows XP, but I guess other versions of Windows might
have other versions of Explorer with different menu entries.

In case all else fails, you might well ask here on this forum about
where to find this dialog, for someone out there is bound to have the
same version of windows as you do and have located it.

Greetings,
Martin von Gagern

 

[robert morris]

Martin,

Beautiful!!

Excel sheets now open approx 20 times faster. Before, took 40-45 seconds,
now, 2 - seconds. Many thanks. Where is Microsoft on this one? I suppose
they are busy repairing Vista and 2007.

Bob Morris

 

[RobN]

Martin,

I too used your method, which worked well for a time, but now, it doesn't.

If I repair Office and/or completely uninstall and reinstall and make the
same changes of adding the "%1" and [rem see command line], to the
appropriate sections to the relevant file types, the problem is fixed again.
BUT the problem doesn't stay fixed!!! After a while, the same slow opening
of the file occurs when trying to open it from a shortcut if Excel is not
already open.
The unusual occurrence of double clicking an Excel shortcut, then minimizing
the Excel program also once used to be a fix, as Excel would automatically
maximize again and open the file. However, that doesn't even work any more
as the file is no longer being opened by that procedure.

Anything else to try?

Rob

 

[Martin von Gagern]

Hi Rob!

Did I get this right, that Excel is slow to start again after a while,
even though the fix still seems to be in place, i.e. the dialog still
shows the described modification?

You should check whether the command you edit is the command that gets
executed. Change it to something else entirely, e.g. Edit.exe or some
such. If it still opens Excel, then it's executing some other command,
but if it opens the other program but after changing back opening Excel
is still slow, then Excel became slow to open files given on the command
line as well.

If Excel is executing some different command, then you could look for
other file associations. Excel 2007 has quite a few formats, and while I
only described XLS, it might be that some of them use different
settings, and that your doubleclick triggerd one of these others.

If you suspect Excel is starting slow for command line arguments as
well, you might try to enter the whole command, with the actual file
name instead of %1, into a command line window. If that is slow as well,
then Microsoft really broke something even more, otherwise it might also
be Explorer being slow to decide whether Excel is running or not.

In any case, it would be interesting what kind of action makes the
system slow again. I suspect it could be some kind of automatic update.

Generally all of you should probably complain to your vendor or some
official Microsoft support contact if you can. My fix is a workaround,
for those annoyed enough to search and lucky enough to find help. A real
fix would be for everyone, distributed by Microsoft. So let them know
there is a problem.

Greetings,
Martin von Gagern