trashing Word preferences

[Carrie]

I noticed that the size of my Word (Mac Office X) preferences is 1.55
G! I have no idea why when the others in the Microsoft folder are
about 4k. Can I trash the Word preferences without major consequence?
Please advise, anyone.

Thanks!
-Carrie

 

[Eric Olson [MSFT]]

That is quite unusual that the Word Settings file would get so large. Word
Settings (10) can be removed. When this file is removed and Word is
re-launched, the Word Settings (X) file will be created.

The Word Settings (10) file mainly holds any changes a user makes to Word
Preferences.

It would be interesting to see what is stored in that file that is making it
so large. If you are curious, you can open this file and take a look at what
it contains.

1. From the File menu select Open
2. At the top of the dialogue box you find the Enable drop down menu. Choose
Recover Text from Any File
3. Navigate to the Word Settings (10) file and open it.
4. Mostly you may find information that is not decipherable. If you find
anything you want to keep, just copy and paste it into another Word
document.

Eric Olson [MSFT]

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Hi Carrie,

Yes, you can (and, under these circumstances, should) trash your Word
preferences. When you reopen Word, a new default preference file will be
created. The only consequence is that you will have to reset your
preferences so you might want to make note of them first.

Another way to test your preferences file is by renaming it instead of
trashing it. Word will still create a new file when you reopen it but now,
if you have any problems or decide you want to restore the old file, you can
trash the new file and rename the old one back.

--
Beth Rosengard
Mac MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/WordMac/index.htm>
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/toc.html>