"Excel cannot complete this task with available resources"

[Ian Grega]

Occasionaly I ask Excel to bite off more than my PC can chew with a lot of
calculations on some large complex spreadsheets.

Is this a software or hardware limitation? Would multiple processors give an
improved performance, a workstation?, supercomputer?, more memory? or does
Excel have limitations?

I also find that to speed up calculations I have to save files and
periodically close Excel, which seems to clear memory allocated to whatever,
is there a way to achieve the same result by not closing Excel?

Appreciate any response,
Thanks - Ian Grega

 

[Dave Peterson]

I'd start here:


Charles Williams' notes on calculation:
http://www.decisionmodels.com/calcsecrets.htm

 

[Ian Grega]

Dave, thanks for that link to Charles Williams site - very informative.

The following quote from that site probably explains what builds up to the
extent that performance is improved if I close and restart a session;
"Within an Excel session both Windows and Excel will cache recently used
data and programs for faster access."

Doubtful that this can be cleared by any method other than closing and
restarting. Someone might know otherwise.

Still not sure if High End machines (workstations, multiple processors etc)
improve performance significantly?

Ian Grega