Standard file dialogs (open, save) cause Office 2007 to hang

[neil.steiner]

I just installed Office Professional Plus 2007 on Windows Server 2003 R2 (64-bit, SP2), and found that the programs are unable to display any of the standard file dialogs, unless I first open the print dialog. This means that I can't open, save as, or insert from inside any Office apps without that extra step. I've uninstalled, reinstalled, rebooted, started Word in Safe Mode (with Ctrl held down), and changed my default printer, all to no avail. In other words:

1. Start Office 2007 app
2. Select Open, Save As, Insert, ...
3. App hangs

1. Start Office 2007 app
2. Select Print and cancel
3. Select Open, Save As, Insert, ...
4. Everything works beautifully

Kind of a peculiar problem to describe, but any thoughts or suggestions would be much appreciated.

[neil.steiner]

A correction: Opening the Print dialog first does resolve the problem in Word and PowerPoint, but not in Excel. Perhaps some similar incantation exists for Excel, but I haven't yet discovered it.

Do you have a network printer? If so, try removing it and adding it back
using the Add Printer Wizard.

The Open and Save As dialog boxes query the printer driver and if your
printer driver is on the network the Office apps may not be able to find it.
When you use the Add Printer Wizard the printer driver is installed locally
which allows the Office apps to find the printer driver when needed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP
https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Melton
What is a Microsoft MVP? http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/gp/mvpfaqs

Guides for the Office 2007 Interface:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/tr...295841033.aspx

"neil.steiner" <neil.steiner.3fn8bb@DoNotSpam.com> wrote in message
news:neil.steiner.3fn8bb@DoNotSpam.com...
>
> I just installed Office Professional Plus 2007 on Windows Server 2003 R2
> (64-bit, SP2), and found that the programs are unable to display any of
> the standard file dialogs, unless I first open the print dialog. This
> means that I can't open, save as, or insert from inside any Office apps
> without that extra step. I've uninstalled, reinstalled, rebooted,
> started Word in Safe Mode (with Ctrl held down), and changed my default
> printer, all to no avail. In other words:
>
> 1. Start Office 2007 app
> 2. Select Open, Save As, Insert, ...
> 3. App hangs
>
> 1. Start Office 2007 app
> 2. Select Print and cancel
> 3. Select Open, Save As, Insert, ...
> 4. Everything works beautifully
>
> Kind of a peculiar problem to describe, but any thoughts or suggestions
> would be much appreciated.

I have just had this start this morning. I do have network printers but I
have removed them completely and restarted my machine. The problem still
exists in all Office 2007 apps. If I do as stated above with the print
dialog it seems to work but why? Any Ideas?

"Beth Melton" wrote:

> Do you have a network printer? If so, try removing it and adding it back
> using the Add Printer Wizard.
>
> The Open and Save As dialog boxes query the printer driver and if your
> printer driver is on the network the Office apps may not be able to find it.
> When you use the Add Printer Wizard the printer driver is installed locally
> which allows the Office apps to find the printer driver when needed.
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Beth Melton
> Microsoft Office MVP
> https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Melton
> What is a Microsoft MVP? http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/gp/mvpfaqs
>
> Guides for the Office 2007 Interface:
> http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/tr...295841033.aspx
>
> "neil.steiner" <neil.steiner.3fn8bb@DoNotSpam.com> wrote in message
> news:neil.steiner.3fn8bb@DoNotSpam.com...
> >
> > I just installed Office Professional Plus 2007 on Windows Server 2003 R2
> > (64-bit, SP2), and found that the programs are unable to display any of
> > the standard file dialogs, unless I first open the print dialog. This
> > means that I can't open, save as, or insert from inside any Office apps
> > without that extra step. I've uninstalled, reinstalled, rebooted,
> > started Word in Safe Mode (with Ctrl held down), and changed my default
> > printer, all to no avail. In other words:
> >
> > 1. Start Office 2007 app
> > 2. Select Open, Save As, Insert, ...
> > 3. App hangs
> >
> > 1. Start Office 2007 app
> > 2. Select Print and cancel
> > 3. Select Open, Save As, Insert, ...
> > 4. Everything works beautifully
> >
> > Kind of a peculiar problem to describe, but any thoughts or suggestions
> > would be much appreciated.
>
>
>

[TMScott]

I had this happen to me this week. It affected both Word 2007 and Excel 2007. I could not save documents in either application. The recommendation to open the Print dialog and then cancel made it possible to save Word documents but this did not work for Excel. After more research in other forums I found a cure for my issue. I moved the temporary internet files to c:\. This resolved the issue for both Word and Excel. This was one of the troubleshooting steps posted by Emily Lin, Miscrosoft Online Partner Support. The tread is at Office 2007 - Vista - Cannot Save to network drive.