Word 2004 hanging unpredictably in 10.4.1, no font error messages

[kikujiro]

I'm experiencing intermittent and unpredictable hangs of Word 2004 in
10.4.1. They don't happen very often, and I am unable to find any
pattern in what I'm doing when it happens (this time I hit apple-F for
find). Tiger installed via archive and install. No font-related error
messages. Hangs are too infrequent to ascertain if I've 'fixed' the
problem by shift-starting, for example.

When I force quit, the application list shows both Application Not
Responding Word and Microsoft Error Reporting.

I'm starting a new post to differentiate my situation from the several
I've read about with font-related error messages.

This is driving me up the wall. If there's any information I can
provide to help fix, please let me know.

 

[Beth Rosengard]

I would recommend some basic troubleshooting first, like logging out and
restarting; then moving on to the topics covered here:
<http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/TroubleshootingIndex.htm>
(If using Safari, hit Refresh once or twice; better yet, use another browser
for this site.)

However, I wouldn't count out font issues just because you aren't seeing
font error messages. In fact, an article I just read in MacWorld cites font
problems as a common cause of various system and application freezes, hangs
and crashes. At least open Font Book (Applications folder) and use the
Resolve Duplicates function to disable duplicate fonts and see if that
helps.

--
***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
(If using Safari, hit Refresh once or twice ­ or use another browser.)
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>

 

[Beth Rosengard]

And then trash all your Office and System font caches. (If you've grouped
fonts into Collections, you'll have to do it over.) Here's where the caches
are:

Com.apple.ATS.plist ~ (home)/Library/Prefs
Com.apple.ATS hard disk/Library/Caches
FontTablesAnnex hard disk/System/Library/Caches
Office Font Cache ~/Library/Preferences/Microsoft
All other files whose names include .ATS or font found in
/System/Library/Caches, especially com.apple.ATS.System.fcache and
com.apple.ATSServer.FODB_System

Then log out and restart.

--
***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
(If using Safari, hit Refresh once or twice ­ or use another browser.)
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>

 

[Marc Bizer]

I'm experiencing intermittent and unpredictable hangs of Word 2004 in
10.4.1. They don't happen very often, and I am unable to find any
pattern in what I'm doing when it happens (this time I hit apple-F for
find). Tiger installed via archive and install. No font-related error
messages. Hangs are too infrequent to ascertain if I've 'fixed' the
problem by shift-starting, for example.

The next time it happens, try this:

1) Launch Font Book, pick a font, and disable it ( Edit Menu, Disable
.... ).
2) Re-enable to go back to normal. However, as soon as the font is
disabled, Word should no longer be hung.

Let us know if it helps.

--Marc