Excel 2003 hangs when opening files from the network

Recently we have seen a lot of users experience extreme slowness or hanging when opening Excel files from a network location.  PCs that are running XP and 2003 are affected whilst those using W7/Office 2003 or XP/Office 2007 or 2010 are fine.

After much searching the fix was actually a recent help article from Microsoft.  After you install MS11-021 and the Office File Validation (OFV) Add-in for Office 2003 (KB 2501584), workbooks stored in a network location open slower over the network in Excel 2003 than they did without the OFV installed. The decrease in performance depends on the size of the workbook and bandwidth of the network and in some scenarios can seem to hang Excel.

Microsoft provide three fixes:

Method 1:
To be able to have both the protection of the OFV, and typical performance over the network when opening files, upgrade to either Microsoft Excel 2007 or Microsoft Excel 2010.

Method 2:
Copy the file to the local workstation. Open and save it in Excel from the local hard drive. Copy the file back to the network location.

Note: If multiple users are accessing the same file, you must be cautious to collaborate with the other users before you copy the file back to the share so that you do not overwrite the changes that were made by another user. The Shared Workbook feature cannot be used with this workaround.

Method 3:

To use Excel 2003 and avoid the network performance issue, you can disable the Microsoft Office File Validation Add-In for Excel by using a registry setting. This removes the additional protection of the OFV for Excel while still protecting the other Office applications.

Realistically, the only short term fix is Method 3!

Instructions to disable Microsoft Office File Validation Add-In are:

You can use the EnableOnLoad registry entry to configure how you want Excel to handle opening workbooks for the OFV. By default, the EnableOnLoad entry is not present in the Windows registry. To add the EnableOnLoadentry to the Windows registry, follow these steps:

1. Exit Excel.
2. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
3. Locate and then click to select the following registry key: **EDIT** Thanks to Frank in the comments , the proper key is ” HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\11.0″ Old key “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Office\11.0\”
4. After you select the key that is specified in step 3, point to New on the Edit menu, and then clickKey.
5. Type Excel, and then press ENTER.
6. Select Excel, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click Key.
7. Type Security, and then press ENTER.
8. Select Security, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click Key.
9. Type FileValidation, and then press ENTER.
10. Select FileValidation, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click DWORD Value.
11. Type EnableOnLoad, and then press ENTER. Note: The default value is 0 which disables the validation.
12. On the File menu, click Exit to quit Registry Editor.

IMPORTANT

This fix needs to be applied at a user level, and for that reason it would be a good idea to include in your logon script.  You can create a registry file called officefix.reg with the following content:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Excel\Security]

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Excel\Security\FileValidation]

“EnableOnLoad”=dword:00000000

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Excel\Security]
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Excel\Security\FileValidation]“EnableOnLoad”=dword:00000000

Then call the registry file with the following command:

Batch scriptREGEDIT /S %filepath%\officefix.reg       —      %filepath% is the path to the registry file.

Windows 2003 Server Hang Issue

Action plan 1 - procedure to generate the MPS reports:

*can be generated at any point of time.

Please download and run the MPS reports downloaded from the link

http://download.microsoft.com/download/b/b/1/bb139fcb-4aac-4fe5-a579-30b0bd915706/MPSRPT_SETUPPerf.EXE

On your system a CAB file will be generated for your convenience in the %systemroot%\MPSReports\Setup\<Report Type>\Cab directory called:

%COMPUTERNAME%_MPSReports.CAB. 

Action plan 2 - to collect Poolmon logs:

*need to run till the issue occurs.

Poolmon: Download the Poolmon3vbs.zip tool online and run the batch file _logpoolmon-as-a-service.cmd in the poolmon folder,

a.     The logs will be generated in the same folder where the poolmon is downloaded to. (Eg. Desktop or C drive)

b.      The complete log folder (Poolmon output) can be used for the analysis

Action plan 3 - System monitor (Performance Monitor):

*need to run till the issue occurs.

We can monitor the performance on the server where you are facing the problem. Please follow the below mentioned commands to setup a remote performance monitoring to this server.

          - Permanently disable all screen savers on the server.

         - As the server hangs so we would have to remotely monitor the server (with the issue) from another Windows 2003 server which does not have any issues and enough drive space.. 

         - Go to the PC (without any issues). Start, Run and type "Perfmon" (without quotation marks) and press OK. 

         - Expand Performance Logs and Alerts. Highlight Counter Logs and right click in the right pane to bring up a menu. From this menu, select "New Log Settings". Give this log a name.

         - Press Add counters. Type in the server name that we want to monitor (Example: in the format: \\Servername) in the "Select counters from computer:" drop-down. 

         - Add "All counters" and "All instances" each of the following objects: 

             Memory 

             Network Interface 

             Objects 

             Paging File 

             Physical Disk 

             Process 

             Processor 

             Redirector 

             Server 

             Server Work Queues 

             System 

         - Set the Interval for every 15 Seconds. 

         - Click on the Log Files tab and set Log file type to Binary Circular File and a Limit of 800,000 KB. Please make sure where the Log is currently save have enough disk space to accommodate.

         - Go to the schedule tab, set the schedule for "Stop Log- Manually" and "Start Log- Manually. 

           

Here is an article for reference: 248345 How to Create a Log Using System Monitor in Windows 2000 http://support.microsoft.com/?id=248345

Action plan 4 - procedure to generate a complete memory dump when the server hangs:

We can configure the machine for a complete memory dump with a registry setting.

Here are the instructions for configuring the machine so that we can create a complete memory dump

First make sure that the machine is setup to get a complete memory dump: 

        1)   In Control Panel, Select the System Applet 

        2)   Select the Advanced tab 

        3)   Click the "Startup and Recovery" button 

        4)   Under the "Write Debugging Information" section select: 

              "Complete Memory Dump" from the drop down menu 

        5)   Make sure the check mark is placed on: 

              "Overwrite any existing file" 

        6)   Make sure that there is a paging file (pagefile.sys) on the System Drive and that it is at least RAM + (.5 x RAM). 

        7)   Also make sure there is more space on the hard drive than there is physical RAM 

Second, configure the system for a dump memory: 

        8)   Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe).  

        9)   Locate the following key in the registry:   

              HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\i8042prt\Parameters  

        10) On the Edit menu, click Add Value, and then add the following registry value: 

              Value Name: CrashOnCtrlScroll   

              Data Type: REG_DWORD   

              Value: 1  

        11) Quit Registry Editor.

        12) Then reboot the machine.  

Now, hold down the RIGHT CTRL key, and press the RIGHT SCROLL LOCK key twice.  

You can use for all the action plan to fix the server hang issues.