Opening files in My Documents is delayed by about 5 seconds

[RobertMerrick]

When I click to open a file in My Documents, I get a delay of about 5 seconds
or quite often I get 'My Documents not responding" Any suggestions please?

 

[Tom Conrad]

Robert,

The most common cause for delayed opening of any file, or program is the
anti-virus program. I don't recommend turning the AV program off. But you may
be able to reconfigure it to speed up your system.

Another common cause of delay and system slowdown is the use of the windows
indexing service. This service speeds up disk searches by maintaining indices
of the files on the disk. The trade off is that the index service can
indavertently slow down file creation, and file saves.

==
Word addins configured to auto start.
Many users have loaded a variety of addins that are set to start along with
word. While this is convenient, if you have 10 addins installed, and only use
3-5 of them in your daily work, then the others are only hogging memory. I
periodically ensure that I have only loaded addins that I will need for the
current session.
==
Not enough System memory (RAM).
Other delays are caused by the limits of the systems total RAM. Since nearly
every piece of modern software wants to maintain a preloaded module in
memory, in order to give the user an icon to click on, there eventually comes
a point where the system runs out of actual physical memory, and has to use
virtual memory.

(Physical RAM is a series of microchips typcially 2Gb or more on most
systems. Virtual memory is a reserved block of hard disk space) When the
system runs of physical memory, it swaps unused program code to virtual
storage. If the hard drive is also full, then things really slow down as
windows scans the disk for available space.

The solution is to turn-off uncessary background programs, processes, and
services. There are several websites that provide advice on what items are
mandatory and/or necessary to safe system operation.

 

[Tom Conrad]

Robert,]

Your post did not identify if this problem was systematic, or limited to a
single file.
Pardon me while I press the DUH button. DUH!

In my other post, I discussed the systematic stuff. I still think that
problem is due to the AV program, since you reported an error message that
the document is not responding to Word, (I believe because the AV program is
examining the file).

If the problem is a single file, then it may be a simple file size issue,
assuming that this file is long, or complexly structured or loaded with
graphics.

If this is the case then the only way to get a slow file to open faster is
to reduce the total file size. Compress the graphics, use styles to condense
the impact of lots of direct formating; turn off fast save (tools menu,
options, save tab, allow fast saves = cleared).

Does the offending file contain multiple embedded versions. The versions
increase the total file size. (Once, I received a ten page document without
graphics, that had a 200mb file size; it turned out that the file had been
reduced from an earlier version that had lots of graphics and 400 pgs. The
original version was saved within the 10 page final document. )

 

[Tom]

You may also have a corrupt Normal.dot file. IF this is the issue, simply
replace the corrupt Normal.dot file with an uncorrupted Normal.dot file.
Normal.dot files are the same from version to version so you should be able
to find a 'friend' who has one.
Symptomatically, a corrupt Normal.dot file manifests itself with very slow
load times for all documents.
HTH,

Robert,]

Your post did not identify if this problem was systematic, or limited to a
single file.
Pardon me while I press the DUH button. DUH!

In my other post, I discussed the systematic stuff. I still think that
problem is due to the AV program, since you reported an error message that
the document is not responding to Word, (I believe because the AV program is
examining the file).

If the problem is a single file, then it may be a simple file size issue,
assuming that this file is long, or complexly structured or loaded with
graphics.

If this is the case then the only way to get a slow file to open faster is
to reduce the total file size. Compress the graphics, use styles to condense
the impact of lots of direct formating; turn off fast save (tools menu,
options, save tab, allow fast saves = cleared).

Does the offending file contain multiple embedded versions. The versions
increase the total file size. (Once, I received a ten page document without
graphics, that had a 200mb file size; it turned out that the file had been
reduced from an earlier version that had lots of graphics and 400 pgs. The
original version was saved within the 10 page final document. )

--
Tom Conrad

==

When I click to open a file in My Documents, I get a delay of about 5 seconds
or quite often I get 'My Documents not responding" Any suggestions please?