# OE, Word & Excel slow to open.



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

Running XP SP2. Since installing Defender and Ewido, I have found that OE, Word or Excel are very slow to open. In the bottom left of the screen a message flashes up briefly, 'virus scanning' or somthing like that. I cannot find a way to disable Defender and Ewido to see if they are the cause, Any suggestions would be appreciated.


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

Hi Ralph

Ewido is a stand alone scanner and will not interfere with Office apps. What is your main AV - is it Norton by any chance? If yes, see here

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/329820/.

Your AV is scanning all Office files before it will open them. You should be able to disable that function.


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

Glaswegian said:


> Hi Ralph
> 
> Ewido is a stand alone scanner and will not interfere with Office apps. What is your main AV
> 
> Your AV is scanning all Office files before it will open them. You should be able to disable that function.


Thanks for the quick response, no I do not use Norton as I am aware of it's failings. My main AV is AVG (free version). As I am not to computer literate some guidence on disabling the function of scanning all files before opening would be appreciated.


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

Hi Ralph

Open AVG Control Center. Now click once on the AVG Resident Shield button. Click on the Properties button at the bottom right corner. In the Properties tab of the dialog box, make sure that the 'Scan All Files' radio button is *not* selected. Just select the 'Scan infectable files' option. That's the way I have my AVG set up so it should work fine for you.

Let me know if this works.


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

Hi Glaswegian,

Thanks for that,

Set AVG as you suggest but I still get the message 'running virus scan' when I first open Word & Excel. They do seem to open s bit quicker thoug. But OE still takes what seems an age to open. Probably on a few seconds but you know how that feels when you are waiting...


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

Ralph

As a test, try closing/disabling AVG completely, then open Word or Excel and see if you get the same message. Might help to rule AVG in or out.


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

Glaswegian,

Sorry to appear thick?? but how do you close/disable AVG?


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

Ralph

I'm at work so I don't have AVG here, but the icon should appear in your System Tray at the bottom right corner. Try a right click on the icon and see if there's an Exit or Close or Shutdown option. If there's no icon, try opening AVG Control Centre then close it again - that should make the icon appear.


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

Iain,
The option it gives is quit AVG control center. Tried that, made no difference.

Ralph


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

Hi Ralph

OK - as I said, I was at work so apologies if that wasn't terribly helpful.

Open AVG and click on the resident shield icon. Now click Properties. In the Properties tab *uncheck* 'Turn on AVG Resident Shield protection'. Let's see if that works.


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

Hi Iain, sorry about the delay in replying. Turning off the 'Resident Shield' in AVG has no effect on the time taken for Word, Excel or OE to open. The only noticable thing is that opening a file in Word or Excel is quicker.


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

Hi Ralph

OK, I think we can rule out AVG. Let's try this: navigate to this folder

*C:\Documents and Settings\”user_name”\Application Data\Microsoft\Office\Recent*

(You may have to be able to view hidden/system files - follow these instructions - go to *My Computer > Tools > Folder Options > View* tab and make sure that Show hidden files and folders is enabled. Also make sure that the System files and Folders are showing / visible. Uncheck the *Hide protected operating system files* option.)

Now delete all files found in that folder and let me know if that helps.


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

Hi Iain

Done as you suggest, Word now takes 6 seconds to open, Excel the same and OE 13 seconds.... I had quite a few emails both received and sent with large photo attachments, I thought that this might be slowing thing down so I deleted all these and it made not one bit of difference...
This is becoming quite a puzzler??

Ralph


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

It is Ralph.

I think you need to try a Repair on Office. Insert your Office CD and choose the Repair option when the menu appears. I'm thinking it could be a registry corruption?


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

The only CD I have is the Windows XP Profesional, it does not seem to have a 'repair' option, or if it does I haven't found it yet.


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

You don't have an Office CD? Was it pre-installed?


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

When I bought this PC it was from a local guy in a small shop who built to order. Needless to say the XP installed was not kosher. So when I wanted to update I was having trouble. Persuaded the guy to pay for Genuine Advantage Kit, which is what the CD I received from MS is called. Doing a search it only comes up with small files for winword, wordpad & wordperfect.


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

Hi

If you don't have the full version of Office (and a CD), I'm a bit stumped. Sorry if that's not much help, but I would have suggested a Detect and Repair or a full re-install as possible solutions. If the software was pre-installed, I think you would need to go back to the source and ask for an installation disk.


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

Source has left the area without forwarding address. I was lucky to get him to pay for the GAK before he disappeared. I think he had upset a lot of people.. Would I be able to borrow an installation disc from someone else??


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

That might work but I wouldn't like to say for sure. One problem may be the different keys. Perhaps worth a try though. Let me know if you have any luck.


----------



## RalphW (May 26, 2006)

OK Iain will do, it may take a few days to get the CD though..


----------



## iosborn (Apr 18, 2007)

Hi.
I have found the same problem on my PC, XP SP2 running AVG 7.5.
I have found it is definitely AVG causing the "running virus scan" in the status bar when opening excel documents. Playing with the various settings in AVG re Resident Shield Scanner has no effect. A complete uninstall of AVG does however fix the problem - excel then opens as fast as usual. Re-installing AVG makes the problem reappear, even when the resident shield scanner is set to off.
Sorry this isn't much help, but the solution lies in tryig another virus scanner, which is a shame because otherwise I have been happy with AVG and it is free.


----------



## Glaswegian (Sep 16, 2005)

Hi

I must admit I have AVG and have never had any problem opening Office files.


----------



## RLM555 (Jan 8, 2009)

I have been trying to figure this one out for awhile now, and I finally got it!
It's NOT the "move %1 from DDE" fix... I tried that one, word would only open blank pages and excel wouldn't open at all.

I recently moved away from Norton and started using AVG on recommendation from my computer guy.
I upgraded to a dual core CPU and while in the shop he pulled out Norton and put in AVG (recently added SAS & MBAM also) 
Well, it seems that he didn't completly remove Norton and that's what was running the virus scan which was delaying the opening of Office files!

I used Norton's removal tool http://service1.symantec.com/Support/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039 and cleaned up the residual pieces that were still hanging around and voila!! .doc & .xls open in a flash

ahhhhhhhhhhhhh

PS: AVG has a place to name file .exts to scan, and you can exclude any that you want


----------

