Word 2003 Hour Glass Clocking issue

[autorat]

When I open files in Word I get a hour glass that won't go away. It just
keeps flashing on the screen. I can type "sort of - it is very slow" and I
can close the program. Any thoughts on what could be running in the
background within word?

 

[Terry Farrell]

Most often it is Norton Anti Virus. If that's what you are using, open NAV
and under advanced options you need to disable the Office Plug-in.

 

[autorat]

Terry, Thank you for the note. I'm using McAfee and did not see disable the
office plug-in as an option in that program. Any other ideas?

 

[Terry Farrell]

Try testing in Safe Mode as this will point to where the problem may be:
from Start, Run (Winkey+R), type in

winword /a

and press enter. How does Word perform in Safe Mode?

Terry

 

[autorat]

Thanks for sticking with me on this issue. Word started without any
problems. I opened a file and it started the arrow/hour glass flashing
scenario and you can hear the laptop fan kick up in speed as if the processor
is being asked to run in heavy use mode.

 

[Terry Farrell]

Open Word and go into Options for Spelling and Grammar and disable the
Spelling and Grammar checking whilst you type options. Does this make any
difference?

If not, open the Windows Task Manager and get it to display Processes with
the order set to Highest Percentage at the top of the list.

Then open Word and a document and switch back to the Task Manager to confirm
that it is winword.exe that is loading the processor.

Terry

 

[autorat]

Sorry for the delay in responding...I was out of town. I turned off spelling
and grammar, but, it didn't make a difference. Task Managr does show
winword at the top of the list using the most CPU units. I also tried
uninstalling and reinstalling office and that did not make a difference
either. Any other thoughts? Thanks again for your help

 

[Terry Farrell]

Naturally, Word should be top of the list but how much CPU is it using? I
would expect it to use around 30-40% when it is opening and about 20% when a
small document is opening. After that, it should settle down to zero if you
are not actually editing the document.

So please open it in Safe Mode whilst watching the task manager to monitor
CPU usage.

Terry

 

[autorat]

CPU % while opening word in safe mode was 20%. Winword without a doc open
fell back to zero right away. Opening a 4 page doc was 58% - 77%. Tried a 1
page doc with the same result. Neither fell below 58% even after waiting 10
minutes without touching the keyboard.

 

[Terry Farrell]

Another test (sorry). Please try a different printer driver. Set it as
default and see if the problem is the same.

Terry

 

[autorat]

Thank you. Thank you. That stopped the clocking and the over running of the
CPU. The printer that was causing the problem was on my wireless network. I
selected a non-network printer and the CPU is barely running. Do I have a
vista compatibility problem or is that normal for word to do this?

Thanks again for the multi days worth of help.

 

[Terry Farrell]

Well Word must see a locally installed printer driver to work. I have seen
several problems with compatibility with some wireless printers but not
quite like yours. I suggest checking to see if there is an updated wireless
printer driver available. If not, stick to a locally connected printer or
Cat5 networked printer.

Terry