# Office 2007 Word and Excel Preview Pane doesn't work



## tbreaux (Jan 30, 2008)

Last week I purchased and installed Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2007 (Enterprise Edition - Home Use Program) from my non-profit employer’s software assurance benefits program under our Volume Licensing Agreement. I have a brand new HP computer (HP M8200n: 3GHz Athlon 64 X2 6000+, 3GB DDR2, 500GB, DVD±RW DL, Windows Vista Home Premium) that the Microsoft Office 2007 suite is now installed on. 

Although I received an installation successful message, I am not able to fully utilize the Preview Pane in either Word or Excel. I have selected the Organize—Layout—Preview option within Word 2007. When I select Open and click on any Word file the Preview Pane remains blank. I can however preview Excel files, graphics files like .jpg, text files like .txt, but I cannot preview Word files within Word. I opened up Excel and I cannot preview any excel files, but I can preview other file types like Word, graphics, text, etc.

What is confusing to me is why can Word preview Excel documents, but not its own Word docs? Likewise, why can Excel preview Word documents, but not its own Excel documents? However, using Vista Explorer I can successfully view all file types in the preview pane within Vista. 

I uninstalled the Office 2007 suite of programs, rebooted, turned off the Vista Firewall and the AVG antivirus program and performed a reinstallation of the suite. However I still have the same problem. Both Vista and Office are installed with the latest updates and I have run a complete scan for viruses on the pc.

I’ve searched the forums and tech support pages and could not find an answer. I did find this issue http://support.microsoft.com/kb/928149 and tried the solution, but I still have the same problem. I also read this article on previewing files in Word without opening them http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/microsoft-office/preview-documents-without-opening-them-in-word-2007 but this didn’t work either. Others have posted to this page with the same issue as mine.

I have hundreds of Word files, I need to be able to preview them to select the correct one before opening. Any ideas?


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## wekebu (Feb 6, 2008)

Hi,
I got the Preview Pane to work by using Windows Explorer. Instead of using Word 2007 and going into Open. Goto the Window's Orb, type in Windows Explorer, from there make sure you have Organize> Layout> Preview Pane selected. It's a work around, but works for previewing.


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## tbreaux (Jan 30, 2008)

I also discovered this work around recently and the preview pane does work in Windows Explorer. I was just hoping to get it to function in Word and Excel as well. Thanks for the tip Wekebu.


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## GTK (Nov 15, 2007)

I am having the same problem, and yes I can use explorer's preview pane.


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## wekebu (Feb 6, 2008)

GTK said:


> I am having the same problem, and yes I can use explorer's preview pane.


Hi,
I can get the Preview Pane to work in Word 2007, if I close Word, do the steps in my first post, open Word, do the same steps for Word> Open> Organize> Layout> Preview Pain, opps, Pane. :1angel:
Sorry, I don't have an easier work around.


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## GTK (Nov 15, 2007)

I called Microsoft, you have 90days free support after purchase. They said it was a known bug and did not have a work around. They said it was an OS (Vista in my case) and not Office 2007???? Anyone else want to pass the buck?


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## Norman Scheuter (Sep 11, 2008)

Hello,

I have the solution, just go to the file winword.exe and right click, then select compatible with windows xp sp2, then apply.
Reopen word and the menu, when you click on open, is different, just like the 2003 version.
Now you can select preview on the right site of the menu and the preview is working!!!

Norman.


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## GTK (Nov 15, 2007)

Thanks, I never thought of that.

God Bless,
George


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