Office 2004 won't install

[CJ Robb]

I can't complete installation of Office 2004 on my Desktop PowerPC G4 (OSX
10.3.3). Everything seems to go fine - putting in my user info, License Key,
etc - until I try to open an application - Word, Excel etc. I get an immediate
notice that something is wrong. I have sent a dozen of these notices off to
Microsoft but haven't seen anyone else reporting such a problem. I then
installed
it fine on the kids' computer (Student version) so I know the install CD
wasn't bad. I combed my harddrive for lurking old test drive versions, even
resorted to removing my Office X installation completely. Just now I
downloaded the test drive version and it also quits the minute I try to open
any of the applications. The error log starts with "Exception:
EXC_BAD_ACCESS"
Other than getting on the phone to Microsoft, are there any suggestions
about how I can proceed to trouble shoot this?

 

[Barry Wainwright]

I can't complete installation of Office 2004 on my Desktop PowerPC G4 (OSX
10.3.3). Everything seems to go fine - putting in my user info, License Key,
etc - until I try to open an application - Word, Excel etc. I get an immediate
notice that something is wrong. I have sent a dozen of these notices off to
Microsoft but haven't seen anyone else reporting such a problem. I then
installed
it fine on the kids' computer (Student version) so I know the install CD
wasn't bad. I combed my harddrive for lurking old test drive versions, even
resorted to removing my Office X installation completely. Just now I
downloaded the test drive version and it also quits the minute I try to open
any of the applications. The error log starts with "Exception:
EXC_BAD_ACCESS"
Other than getting on the phone to Microsoft, are there any suggestions
about how I can proceed to trouble shoot this?

On the CD, under the one of the subfolders called 'tools & utilities' or
something similar (sorry, I don't have a CD with me at the moment) there is
a utility to remove office. This will remove all previous versions (but
leave your data alone). I'd suggest you try running this, then repair
permissions, then install again, then repair permissions again.

 

[ceezweb]

Thanks but I've already done all of that (several times, in fact). Repaired
permissions, even checked the drive with the OSX CD. As it turned out
permissions never needed repair nor did the disk. The first time I installed
Office 2004, I started with Entourage as the first module I tried, and it
worked - at least I was getting my mail; never had a chance to try anything
else in Entourage but it imported my old mail correctly. Then I tried to
open Word and the crashing began. Since that first install, I have removed
every Office version I had, even 98, using the included Remove Office applet
and also emptied the Trash. Turned off ALL items that were auto starting.
Tried setting up a new admin user and installing Office 2004 from there. Did
NOT try installing Entourage during all my subsequent attempts, and
therefore did not import old mail, in case I might have a flakey Entourage
database. No joy. Clearly there's something on MY computer that's weird but
I haven't a clue how to figure it out.

 

[Stephen Adams]

I can't complete installation of Office 2004 on my Desktop PowerPC G4 (OSX
10.3.3). Everything seems to go fine - putting in my user info, License Key,
etc - until I try to open an application - Word, Excel etc. I get an immediate
notice that something is wrong. I have sent a dozen of these notices off to
Microsoft but haven't seen anyone else reporting such a problem. I then
installed
it fine on the kids' computer (Student version) so I know the install CD
wasn't bad. I combed my harddrive for lurking old test drive versions, even
resorted to removing my Office X installation completely. Just now I
downloaded the test drive version and it also quits the minute I try to open
any of the applications. The error log starts with "Exception:
EXC_BAD_ACCESS"
Other than getting on the phone to Microsoft, are there any suggestions
about how I can proceed to trouble shoot this?

Do you have any haxies installed on your machine that's not on your
kids'? Sometimes, third party utilities and/or haxies that are quietly
running in the background will affect an install.

You could also verify your disk's file system and/or repair permissions
using Panther's equivalent of Jaguar's Disk Utility.

Regards,

Steve

 

[Tom Humphries]

i am having the exact same problem. the bad access error seems to be
coming from something with the fonts - it says the module that is creating
problems is that ATS module. i tried cleaning out all of the font caches,
moving fonts out of folders, everything i can think of and i get the same
problem. i have disabled haxies, removed all office versions with the
uninstaller, reinstalled, same problems. won't even load one of the
applications. has anyone figured out how to fix this problem?

thanks,
Tom

 

[Tom Humphries]

I was having the same exact problem and finally figured it out today. I used
the built in Font Book application on 10.3 and disabled all of my fonts and
then word, excel and powerpoint worked fine. i then started enabling them
in groups and finally identified the one font that was crashing all of the
applications. for me, it was TremorITC TT. I hope this helps you get office
working on your computer - it was bugging me to death!

Tom

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur [MVP]]

i then started enabling them
in groups and finally identified the one font that was crashing all of the
applications. for me, it was TremorITC TT. I hope this helps you get
office
working on your computer - it was bugging me to death!

Thanks a lot for posting the solution to the group. I'm sure it'll help a lot
of people,


Corentin

 

[ceezweb]

Tom, I REALLY appreciate your posting this to the newsgroup. I disabled all
but system fonts and the Office 2004 applications then loaded up just fine.
Now all I have do is get time to find the offending font (or fonts). I
wonder if there's an easier way to find corrupted fonts? Regardless, I'm on
the road to joy, thanks to you.

BTW my computer also had TremorITC TT, whereas the kids's computer does not.
However, disabling that one alone made no difference, so my copy of that one
is apparently intact. I thought I'd go for the gold ring and try disabling
just that one as a first experiment but alas. I'll have to keep searching.

Thanks again!

CJ - wish I could buy you a beer or an ice cream cone

 

[artie]

Having the same problem on my dual g4 MDD (10.3.3). Office 2004
installed on the kid's imac and on my wife's g4 iBook (office 2004
student/teacher) but it craps out with EXC_BAD_ACCESS on the MDD.

My standard spell for major installs is to use Cocktail to flush caches
and repair permissions, reboot, do the install, run Cocktail again to
repair permissions, reboot again.

No dice.

Used remove office to remove office 2004. The first time on the MDD I
did a click install, using the installer on the CD. For the other two
machines, I'd done drag installs, so I did a drag install on the MDD.
No dice, still dies with EXC_BAD_ACCESS.

The various font utilities I have (and have tried) can't find damaged
fonts.

The MDD has >1GB of RAM, the other two are 3/4 GB. The iBook is less
than a month old and pretty virginal. The kid's iMac (400 MHz G3) has
all sorts of random crap on it. I did a complete format/install on the
MDD about three months ago.

Any more hints?

 

[artie]

Thanks to Tom Humphries!

I had 2 bad fonts -- which some highly rated "font checker" programs
didn't find fault with.

Recipe --

Using Font Book, disable all fonts (the hard-wired system ones stay on,
don't worry)

Double-click word (excel, etc) to see if it starts. if it does, quit
it, click on font book, enable a group of fonts, and try again.

I did fonts by letter, found the first one in the "e" group. Found the
other in the "m" group.

pain-in-the-ass

But it's up and working! Oh joy! New bugs!

 

[artie]

Thanks to Tom Humphries!

I had 2 bad fonts -- which some highly rated "font checker" programs
didn't find fault with.

Recipe --

Using Font Book, disable all fonts (the hard-wired system ones stay on,
don't worry)

Double-click word (excel, etc) to see if it starts. if it does, quit
it, click on font book, enable a group of fonts, and try again.

I did fonts by letter, found the first one in the "e" group. Found the
other in the "m" group.

pain-in-the-ass

But it's up and working! Oh joy! New bugs!