Comments on: Excel files open slow from Windows Explorer

By: Ludwig

Ludwig — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 14:30:25 +0000

Hi All,

The adding of the “%1″ and uncheck of the use DDE did the trick to open the excel files ‘lightning fast’ again from explorer!
Thanks for the great hint!

By: VancouverVince

VancouverVince — Sat, 13 Aug 2011 01:16:29 +0000

I started experiencing this recent on an XP Pro Office 2003 system.

Interestingly it worked fine the first time after a restart.

In the end I unchecked DDE and followed Hank’s advice (8 above) by adding “%1″ to the end of the &OPEN descriptions for DOC and XLS.

At another website they have tied this to a recent Microsoft patch and recommend: “Uninstall Excel update #KB2541025 then restart.”

Hoping for an easy solution I first tried un-checking “Enable Java Script” in FireFox and un-chekcing “Disable Script Debugging (both IE and Other). Did not solve my problem. And once I un-checked DDE on DOC and XLS I reverted both FireFox and Internet Options (and things continue to run fast).

By: Steve Devereux

Steve Devereux — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 11:39:27 +0000

The IE debugging tip worked for me too. Amazing, I’d been looking for an answer to this for months! Thank you so much.

By: Matteo

Matteo — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 09:00:43 +0000

Really an excellent solution for this issue where only Explorer is slow to open Office files (while other ways such as Recent Documents work fine).
Thank you!

By: umashankar

umashankar — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 07:18:51 +0000

I suspect that it is problem with windows explorer.

because if you try to open excel file in sage mode.it opens instantly.

but takes long time throught windows explorer.

it means explorer get corrupted.try to repair the explorer with opearating system Installation CD.

By: Nate

Nate — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 06:14:21 +0000

awesome. many other solutions did not work, but this did. thanks.

By: Mike Koleszar

Mike Koleszar — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:25:59 +0000

This solved my problem when many other solutions did not. The trick was the quotation marks around %1. Thank you!

By: Stu

Stu — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 16:42:22 +0000

How do you do this in Vista?

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 22:38:56 +0000

I also tried messing with the file type stuff to no avail. I also tried some of the “Ignore other applications” suggestions in other threads (Tools -> Options -> general Tab in Excel). That made no difference either.

I then tried the disable java script in firefox, and that made no difference. Then I tried turning off debugging in IE. THAT WORKED!!! excel docs (when I double click on them) now open practically instantaneously. I then went back and turned on the javascript in firefox, and the XLS docs still open quickly, so I only needed to turn off the debugging in IE.

I’m running XP home, with Office 2003. (I have NO idea why this made any difference, considering I rarely have IE up and running)

The debugging stuff under IE that I disabled is: Tools -> Internet Options, then under the Advanced tab, uncheck “Disable Script Debugging (Internet Explorer)” and “Disable Script Debugging (Other)” and that was it. Thanks for the tip Hank!

By: Yamaeda

Yamaeda — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 15:14:52 +0000

Thanks, this lead me in the right direction, but wasn’t the full answer. From the link i learned that Explorer makes a DDE call, and from above that i can check how windows calls a file extension.

In my case it was the DDE-parameter in [point 8] that was the problem, clearing that made it instant. I had some “[DDE]%1″ before