Outlook XP Pro will not open word as e-mail editor. Why?

[John D]

I recently had to reinstall Office XP Professional 2002 on my Laptop (I
already have it on my PC and it runs perfectly). When I try to open a new
document Outlook will not open Word. I get a message saying Word is busy or
cannot be found. I have gone to Tools, Options, Mail Format and checked the
Word box but that doesn't work. When I open a new document I get the above
message and the Word box in mail format has been unchecked.
Is there a solution to this problem? It's new to me.

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

You should never reinstall Office and expect it to fix anything or work.
There appear to be a whole host of causes for this error message. Most have
no solution. Here are a few that do:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q284900
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q319796
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q196871
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q223934

In the most refractory of cases, you can try this at your own risk:
Get the Windows Installer Cleanup utility from Microsoft.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;290301

Then uninstall Word and run the installer cleanup utility to remove anything
that has Word in it and\or remove information from any previous version of
Microsoft Office. Reboot. Then re-install Word. Reboot. Then run Office
Detect and Repair. Reboot.

To use the Windows installer cleanup utility to remove Word:
1. Click Start, point to All Programs, and then click Windows Install Clean
Up.
2. In the list of installed programs, click Word or the earlier Office
installation, and then click Remove.
3. When the removal process is completed, click OK, and then click Exit.