Monday, November 24, 2008

Simple Operation to Repair Microsoft Excel

Running Excel with the /regserver switch will cause Excel to rewrite all of its keys in the system registry. That rewrites all of the class ids for all the controls and objects back to the registry, overwriting any values that may have become corrupt. In addition all library files and type library get reassociated correctly.

It doesn't replace all of the actual libraries file like a real install does, but it rebuilds all the associations between those libraries and objects with the "factory defaults". It cannot fix a file because it doesn't alter the files, but can repair a faulty "reference" to a DLL, or something pointing to the wrong library.

This method can cure lots of odd problems with Excel, and is far easier and safer than doing a real re-install of the program. You don't have to worry about losing your toolbars etc. Before you ever do a full re-install, you should always run Excel with the /regserver switch as it may save you a lot of time and trouble.

(Press Windows Key + R, then type Excel /regserver to reset the registry)

[Comments from Chip Pearson via Excel.Programing Newsgroup]

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