PowerPoint 2004 (11.2) in OS 10.4.3 /4 hangs when opening large PP X document

[macguitarman]

Came across this a few days ago.

On a brand new iBook with 10.4.4 (or 10.4.3), 1 GB of RAM on it and MS
Office 2004, PP hangs (not responding) when opening a large Power Point
document created in Office X (10.1.4).

PowerPoint file is over 200 MB

This same file opens fine in the older Office X (PowerPoint 10.1.4) on
the same iBook with same config.

This looks like a bug in PowerPoint 2004 (11.2)

I even captured the sample data from PowerPoint 2004 (11.2) with
Apple's tools and have the report file, obviously somethhing is going
on within PowerPoint 2004 (11.2)

How can I get this bug report to MS Macintosh Business Unit, I am sure
not going to pay MS for submitting a support e-mail (which is what they
imply on thier website).

Especially when I am doing their QA job for them.

Has to be an easier way to let the MBU at MS become aware of Mac bugs
with their products

I do have the PP application sample data report available.

thanks,
macguitarman
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi Guitarman,

By posting your plight here in the newsgroup your message will sooner or
later be seen by someone at Microsoft. This is a group that is monitored
by Microsoft employees.

I would take a few moments and run Apple's Disk Utility to repair
permissions and then DiskWarrior to make sure the directory is OK. It
sounds like there is probably a PowerPoint problem, but a system problem
that might be easy to fix could also be the culprit. Let's try narrowing
things down a bit to make sure we're pointing the finger at the right
pointee.

-Jim

 

[macguitarman]

Definitely not a system's issue. (I am a veteran Mac sys admin /
engineer and did QA at Apple on Final Cut Pro).

This is a brand new Mac OS 10.4.4 image, permissions are fine, file
system is fine.

Same issue on 10.4.3, I'd rather not regress to a Mac OS 10.4x older
than 10.4.3.

To me this is an issue / bug with PowerPoint 2004.

(Granted this is a large Power Point file of over 200 MB, the user
would be better server scaling these images down, but it does open in
the older PP X version.

macguitarman

 

[macguitarman]

Also, did the same test on my Power Mac G5 dual 2.0 (a different
machine) same thing on 10.4.4 and 10.4.3. This should not be happening
and I would be surprised if Microsoft has not seen this.

Also, I rule out the PP file, because it does open in the older PP X.

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Thanks for supplying the details about the troubleshooting. I agree that
it certainly sounds like a PowerPoint problem.

If you are willing to let Microsoft have a copy of the file I can send
it to the MacBU. I take it the file is too large to email, but if you
make it available from a web site and send the URL to me I'll get it to
the right folks.

I hope you can figure out my real email address from my return address
above. Remember that "hot" is "warmer than warm."

-Jim