Powerpoint 2004 crashes when selecting a new design

[Peter Keady]

I've tried repeatedly to get PPT to work. Upgraded from Office X
(which worked well - not flawlessly). When beginning a new
presentation in 2004, if I try to select a new slide design PPT
crashes. I've trashed the preferences and even reinstalled the entire
program. Still have major issues.

Using a Ti with 1 gig RAM, no other programs running.

Peter

 

[James D. Bruce]

I experienced this problem today with a new presentation. I also cannot
open presentations constructed in Office X ppt. Advise I've previously had
said to remove earlier versions of Office and to manually check for Microsoft
plist files after doing the remove operation and trash them. Did all this to
no avail.

Anyone have ideas?

...................................jim

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi James,

First I'd give Disk Utility a go at the drive and have it repair permissions
(First Aid).

Your symptoms sound something like this, but not quite:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;313535

Repair permissions first. If that doesn't fix things then have a look at the
article.

-Jim

--
Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

MVPs are not Microsoft Employees
MVP info

 

[James D. Bruce]

Jim --- I had actually found advice to repair permissions and the reference
you provided after I sent my original post. I tried followed the advice then
to no avail.

Earlier this afternoon I made a second pass just in case I was unsuccessful
the first time in following directions. ;-) I did find a third font library --
System Folder>Fonts in addition to System>Library>Fonts and
Users.Personal_USID>Library>Fonts -- and it contained one duplicated font.

So with much hope, I fired up PowerPoint 2004 and tried to open a
presentation created in X. But, PowerPoint 2004 crashed. I can create new
presentations -- and change backgrounds which I could not do before --
and save them. They open without difficulty.

As far as I can tell, I can open word and excel documents created via Office
X in Office 2004, create new ones in Office 2004, with no problem. The
format is backwards compatible, etc.

So, I've made a bit of headway -- the backgrounds point made earlier -- but
I'm still not there. So back to Office X.

Additional thoughts would be appreciated..................jim bruce

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi James,

If you are willing to send one of the troubled presentations to me I'll try
opening it in PPT2004 here and see what happens.

Think "hot" in place of "warmer than warm" when you look at my email
address.

-Jim

Jim --- I had actually found advice to repair permissions and the reference
you provided after I sent my original post. I tried followed the advice then
to no avail.

Earlier this afternoon I made a second pass just in case I was unsuccessful
the first time in following directions. ;-) I did find a third font library
--
System Folder>Fonts in addition to System>Library>Fonts and
Users.Personal_USID>Library>Fonts -- and it contained one duplicated font.

So with much hope, I fired up PowerPoint 2004 and tried to open a
presentation created in X. But, PowerPoint 2004 crashed. I can create new
presentations -- and change backgrounds which I could not do before --
and save them. They open without difficulty.

As far as I can tell, I can open word and excel documents created via Office
X in Office 2004, create new ones in Office 2004, with no problem. The
format is backwards compatible, etc.

So, I've made a bit of headway -- the backgrounds point made earlier -- but
I'm still not there. So back to Office X.

Additional thoughts would be appreciated..................jim bruce

--
Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

MVPs are not Microsoft Employees
MVP info

 

[David Padfield]

I've had the same problem of not being able to open new presentatons. I
sort of know what the problem is -- it has something to do with available
fonts (not corrupt fonts). New presentations worked until I turned off a few
fonts, and then PowerPoint started crashing everytime I tried to make a new
presentaion using a stock template. Apparently, if you try to create a new
presentation from a temlate and it uses a font you do not have open it will
crash the program -- not very graceful, but definitely a Microsoft style.

The problem is I have not idea of what fonts HAVE to be open for the
program to work, and I can't find anything from Microsoft that will help.

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi David,

Although you haven't posted enough information for someone to be able to
attempt to duplicate the problem, perhaps I can help a little bit.

From PowerPoint help:
"Compatibility Report: Font substitution has occurred
If you open a presentation that uses fonts that you don't have installed on
your computer, Microsoft PowerPoint substitutes fonts that you do have."

So the compatibility report should be able to point out that font
substitution has occurred.

You can find out what fonts are being used in any presentation by using File

Properties > Contents

Based on past experience, what is happening is that PowerPoint is
substituting a font that is corrupt, and it is that corruption that is
causing PowerPoint to quit.

On the other hand it is also possible that PowerPoint is behaving as you
described and crashing when it attempts to substitute. Using the
compatibility report, the contents pane, and switching fonts in and out you
should be able to ascertain which font PowerPoint is attempting to
substitute for whatever font is missing. Switching out the font that's
causing the crash will probably solve this mystery.

-Jim
--
Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

MVPs are not Microsoft Employees
MVP info

 

[Amar]

This all sounds very promising, but we are not quite there yet.

Consider this scenario: You open a new presentation, do nothing to it,
just click in that new pane to change to a different design template -
and, puff, PowerPoint is gone! Happens to me everytime.

If there is some sort of font substitution occurring, then it must be
something in the master slides or anywhere else, because I haven't written
anything yet. But judging from previous font troubles in OS X it DOES
smell like that! I just can't pinpoint exactly what's going on.

 

[Amar]

This all sounds very promising, but we are not quite there yet.

Consider this scenario: You open a new presentation, do nothing to it,
just click in that new pane to change to a different design template -
and, puff, PowerPoint is gone! Happens to me everytime.

If there is some sort of font substitution occurring, then it must be
something in the master slides or anywhere else, because I haven't written
anything yet. But judging from previous font troubles in OS X it DOES
smell like that! I just can't pinpoint exactly what's going on.

 

[Mickey Stevens]

Jeff Worboys, with a similar issue, reported the following:
"I found the issue. While looking through a folder I found a file that
looked like some sort of temp file. It was named TW######.(some ext) (# =
some numbers) I trashed it but it would not delete saying it was in use. I
restarted...it disappeared and voila! Powerpoint will allow changing the
slide design just like before."

Also be sure to delete files beginning with "PowerPoint Temp". See if that
helps.

 

[David Padfield]

I'm sorry, but I am tired of Beta-testing PowerPoint for Microsoft. It crashes
on a regular basis anytime I try to create a new presentation. I've tried it on
four different macs, and have the same problem everytime. I have taken it
off of all of my computers (I only need it on one).

I have reinstalled Office v.X and will use it until Microsoft can create a patch
to fix this bug-loaded software.

 

[Amar]

Hi,

I did a search for the mentioned files, it did not find any of them. Where are
they located? Thanks for helping.

 

[Pb]

These files aren't the problem it is whether a chosen font is "on" or
"off". Everything worked fine in PP until I started playing with the
fontbook and tried to "hide" what I thought were little needed fonts.
I have quite a library of them and I am sure I don't need half of
them. The fonts are fine. They are not corrupt (there are just too
many of them). They have all been accumulated over the years from one
program or another. None were obtained through nefarious means.

I recently went to create a presentation chose to change the design
and "wham!" away went the program. I tried this several times (I was
a software developer before I went back to teaching so I know how
important it is to carefully document the circumstances of the crash).
Even if you open a template with a new design the application shuts
down.

Based on the posts here I went back to the font book and turned all
the fonts back "on". The crash no longer occurs.

MS definitely has an issue when a font is not available. This is an
easily foresee-able problem. Preflight the font list before loading
the design, if the font isn't available: warn the user and make a
substitution, let the user change the choice if it isn't pleasing.

I understand the difficulties of making truly cross platform
presnetations. The stardard screen res for MS is 92 dpi and the mac
is (or was 72) although all of these are user selectable. Fonts
might be stored as bitmap in which case the scaling is different. I
believe MS vetted some fonts (which were not bit mapped) which were
cross platform. Stick to these fonts and everything should more or
less scale appropriately.

I develop PP presentations on my Macs at home but present on windows
machines at school. As long as I am conservative about my choices
things usually work smoothly. I agree it isn't a perfect solution
but I'd rather light a candle than scream at the Darkness.

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

MS definitely has an issue when a font is not available. This is an

easily foresee-able problem. Preflight the font list before loading
the design, if the font isn't available: warn the user and make a
substitution, let the user change the choice if it isn't pleasing.

I don't have 2004 yet, but fwiw, no previous version has ever had any problems
due to missing fonts, PC or Mac. PPT looks for the font requested by the
template or presentation and simply substitutes another (or more likely accepts
the substitute proposed by the OS, since it's the OS in both cases that
supplies the font handling mechanisms).

I understand the difficulties of making truly cross platform
presnetations. The stardard screen res for MS is 92 dpi and the mac
is (or was 72) although all of these are user selectable. Fonts
might be stored as bitmap in which case the scaling is different.

It's very unlikely that you'll find bitmap fonts any more. They used to be
common but that was a long time ago. They mostly disappeared in the early 90s

Now most fonts are TrueType, Type 1 or OpenType, all of which are vector, so
are scaleable.

None of this is to minimize the problem you're having, but to suggest that it
may be something more than just the font being missing. Perhaps the system is
handing PPT a substitute font that has a problem, for example. Unfortunately,
it's hard to tell what the subbed font is.

--
Steve Rindsberg, PPT MVP
PPT FAQ: www.pptfaq.com
PPTools: www.pptools.com
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