Word stops responding and I lose my work.

[SJC_Weevil]

My word document stops responding. I can't save without END TASK. If I look
at the processes tab in Task Manager, winword.exe file size increases in
increments of +/-200K as I watch. The file grows from 9MB to 175MB in no
time.

I'm trying to finish my dissertation - deadline looming, my usual help
friends are out of town and I am nearing frantic.

Also in Task Manager, there's 37 files that I have no idea what they are
doing - even if I have no file open. I've tried shutdown, power back and
already they are there. Some are quite big.

What do I do? Oh, Please and Thank-you-very-much.

 

[Jay Freedman]

My word document stops responding. I can't save without END TASK. If I look
at the processes tab in Task Manager, winword.exe file size increases in
increments of +/-200K as I watch. The file grows from 9MB to 175MB in no
time.

I'm trying to finish my dissertation - deadline looming, my usual help
friends are out of town and I am nearing frantic.

Also in Task Manager, there's 37 files that I have no idea what they are
doing - even if I have no file open. I've tried shutdown, power back and
already they are there. Some are quite big.

What do I do? Oh, Please and Thank-you-very-much.

The growing file size is generally caused by corruption of either the
document or the Normal.dot template. If this happens only with one
document, try cleaning that one with the procedures in
http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/AppErrors/CorruptDoc.htm. If it's
happening to most or all documents, try the template-cleaning
suggestions in the same document, or go to
http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/AppErrors/ProbsOpeningWord.htm (those
procedures usually cure all sorts of problems, not just opening or
crashing).

The processes listed in Task Manager handle all sorts of background
tasks: networking, scheduling, antivirus, and more. Often you'll see
several entries for svchost.exe, which is a "service host" for other
programs. Having 37 processes running right after startup isn't at all
unusual, so you can relax about that.

 

[SJC_Weevil]

Thank you for the reply. I'm not sure yet if A was helpful yet (it would be
due to my lack of understanding of how this all works - but I'm working it
out). B was helpful, I was relieved to know all those files are ok.

I've tried fiddling with Normal.dot without much change. Fiddling means I
searched and found Normal.dots with word closed, renamed them abnormals, then
opened word, so it would generate a new normal.dot. However, before I read
all the Normal.dot stuff, my document asked if I wanted to save my new
normal.dot and I said yes - later finding out I should not have done that.
So this morning I repeated the rename, open word but it still locks up on
closing and has to be shut down by END Program from task manager.

I've isolated the problem to be in the one document. I tested other
documents and they seem OK so far. (They don't crash.) Other programs work
fine (Excel) with multiple screens open and closes OK. My file continues to
grow but not so fast.

Deleting a bibliography generated by EndNote helped. EndNote is a
bibliographic program which has attached itself to WORD and is supposed to
be compatible. It has a place in my TOOLS menu. Deleting that bibliography
helped the problem somewhat - so I can now "save" before closing, then close.
It still locksup but my work isn't lost. Can I detach EndNote without
loosing the EndNote program and the references I labored so hard to generate?

Right now I'm living with it by working, saving, closing the document (END
Program). Then reopening, working, etc.

To stop the crashed document, I use Task Manager's End Program. When I
looked in the Processes tab, I can still see my 8 MB file grow to 177 MB in
increments of about 200 KB. If that happens I get a "not sufficient memory
to do this task" or something like that, then it locks up. My "properties"
for Windows shows I haven't even used 1/2 of all my memory. I know there
are two kinds: RAM and something else but don't which the "pie chart" for
memory refers to or how they work..

So, Can I detach EndNote from Word, or find hidden codes in my document, and
still keep the Endnote program and data in tact as an independent program?

I really DO appreciate the time you took to steer me to a solution. I'll
continue to read on Normal.dot.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

If you've had a lot of crashes and haven't cleaned up after them, then a
large accumulation of temp files may be at least one cause of the problem.
See http://www.gmayor.com/what_to_do_when_word_crashes.htm

 

[Jay Freedman]

Ah yes, I should have point out that article before.

After you clean up the temp files, if the problem continues:

- Have you tried saving the document in either RTF or HTML format and then
resaving the result as a Word document, as discussed in the CorruptDoc
article?

- I'm not personally familiar with EndNote, although many people use it. I'm
not sure whether it's an ordinary add-in template or one of the other kinds
of add-in
(http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Customization/CheckIfAddinsInstalled.htm).
Someone else will have to tell you whether you can remove it and still keep
your previous work intact.