Word crashes often, mystery white box and a missing cursor.

[nicktdna]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard)
Processor: Intel

So, word for Mac 2008 (12.1.2) crashes alot.

I'll be typing away, then scroll to a different part of the document and it'll crash. Sometimes, it just crashes mid sentence. I feel that it might be worse when track changes is on. I have issues with track changes and endnote anyway.

After a few minutes of use, i always get a mysterious empty white box at the top left corner of the screen, associated with word. I have a screen shot of this if anyone is interested.

I think a common warning sign is the disappearance of the cursor in word - it's like typing blind.

I go to check for updates, but that doesn't find any or can't connect to the server, so i'm on 12.1.2. I also use Endnote alot.

Also, word never seems to properly know which 'space' it's supposed to be in, but that's minor compared to the other issues! This seems to be common to office programs in general.

Rant over, thanks for reading, any comments appreciated.......
Nick

 

[CyberTaz]

Virtually all of the problems you're having are directly related to the fact
that Office is seriously behind in major updates, specifically SP2 (12.2.0)
plus the 12.2.1 which followed it. I don't know why Check for Updates isn't
retrieving them for you [unless you're using Apple's Software Update or
something other than the feature from the Help menu in one of the Office
apps] but without them you have no fixes for the issues involved.

Try this link to get Office updated, repair disk permissions & restart
afterward before launching any of the Office programs:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...bb-b5f7-4946-bb7b-b0c6c6d6e28c&displaylang=en

The reliability of Track Changes depends a great deal on how you're using
it. If you're leaving it on continuously and/or repeatedly revising the same
parts of the document it will invariably result in erratic behaviors & lead
to corruption of the file. You may want to download Clive Huggan's "notes"
entitled "Bend Word to Your Will" -- an invaluable asset for many aspects of
Word, but particularly the topics:

Track changes, turning off

Track changes, important settings for

Track changes, using - if you really can't use "compare documents"

Always remember this if you are tracking changes

You can download it free from:
http://word.mvps.org/Mac/Bend/BendWordToYourWill.html