Word 2002 with Vista

[Dan]

I've been running Office 02 with Vista for about 6 months without issue. A
few weeks back, I started running in to issues with Word. I can only open
Word in Safe mode. At no point can I open an existing document.

So far, here are the steps I've taken:
- Uninstall completely and reinstall Word
- I've removed the normal.dot.
- I've verified that I have NO addins other than WordEEFonts which seems to
be harmless.
- I have NO toolbars other than the stock MS.
- I've read through all of the walkthroughs and MS documents that have been
listed here and elsewhere and tried the various ideas.
- I do not have any new printers installed that were not there the day I
installed Office.

To further confuse matters (for me at least), I have no issues with
Excel/Access/Powerpoint.

Any thoughts? I'm at my wits end.

 

[Terry Farrell]

See http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/AppErrors/ProbsOpeningWord.htm

 

[Dan]

Terry,

As I said in my first post, I already tried all of that. In theory, I would
follow the "If Word Crashes as Soon as it Opens" even thought it does not
crash.

I've renamed and removed Normal.bat file with no success.

I've opened Word in Safe mode (both via Run and using Ctrl. That will open
Word but I cannot access any existing documents. Even if I create one in
Safe Mode, I cannot reopen it later.

I've deleted the potentially corrupy Registry key - it did not appear to
regenerate itself.

I do not have a network printer hooked up, not have I ever had one on this
particular computer.

I do not run any Norton products on this machine. Additionally, I do not
run Outlook, so there should be no Outlook Journal conflicts.

I never get an error message until I kill Word via Task Manager.
Regardless, there wasn't anything in the Startup that was mentioned in that
and other articles.

Do you have any other suggestions besides the generic help article that I
already said did not work?

Thanks,
Dan

 

[Terry Farrell]

As a test, find winword.exe (in Program Files, under Microsoft Office),
right-click and select Run as Administrator. Does that open now?

Terry

 

[Dan]

It just hangs. In addition, I only using one account on the machine and it
is an Admin.

Dan

 

[Terry Farrell]

Try the tips in this FAQ. If none work, report back for some further help
with this. See http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/AppErrors/ProbsOpeningWord.htm

Terry

 

[Dan]

I've tried everything in that list multiple times to no avail.

Dan

 

[Terry Farrell]

Well if Word hangs when launched, it usually indicates a corrupt normal.dot,
a corrupt or incompatible printer driver, a corrupt or incompatible add-in
or possibly (though far less likely) a corrupt Word Data Key in the
registry. As it starts in Safe Mode, it definitely indicates one of those
causes. In Safe Mode, Word is starting in its default install condition
bypassing all templates, add-ins, macros, customisations, etc. There just
isn't anything else. It MUST be one of those causes.

Terry

 

[Dan]

Well the lack of printers and addons means it has to be a corrupt normal.dot.
Since I'm unable to correct that, how do I go about completely uninstalling?
Deleting or renaming that file does not seem to correct the issue. If I
uninstall and reinstall, will I have the same issues? Or do I need to
reformat the drive and start anew?

 

[Terry Farrell]

No printer? Well that is your problem. Word MUST have and see a locally
installed printer driver. It doesn't matter if you don't actually have a
printer, but Word must see a printer driver that is set as the Windows
default.

Terry

 

[Dan]

I forgot a key word ... no Network printer. I had a local one that was
working fine.

 

[Terry Farrell]

From all the symptoms, I still believe this is the printer driver. Please
try a different printer driver: it doesn't matter if you don't have another
printer, just get a driver (download a Canon ip4300 driver as I know this
works fine with Word 2007) and install it as a local printer set to Windows
default and test.

Terry

 

[Felesa]

I am also having this same problem. Did you find a solution