Microsoft word from office home and student only opens in safe mode?

Question

The system is a dell vista 32x running Microsoft 2007 office home and student. When I start word, it only shows in safe mode to be able to type. Of course, this doesn't give enough options so I need to open in the "normal" mode. I have tried the repair cd, to no avail. As well as going to programs and clicking repair, to no avail. Also have rebooted since the problem started. I installed a kids game, Madagascar, to the laptop and when I did this, the problems began with word. When it opens in "normal" mode, it takes forever to open the window and says "word is not responding." I have looked all over the internet to find a solution and I have found forums with answers such as, go to regedit and find " " file, and are too afraid to edit anything on my own, as this is not my computer. It gives an option to go to Microsoft's site, but it is not pulling up. This problem is only with Microsoft Word, no other Microsoft programs. I also have an issue with Firefox and IE freezing up and eventually I have to completely exit because I will wait forever and they do not change. I'm not sure if the internet servers would add in to the situation or not, but I thought I'd throw that out there, just in case. There are some times that when I try to restart the computer, the blue screen of death comes on and will not go away until it restarts itself. It restarts on its own about 3 times before it goes back to normal. Have any suggestions? Please let me know. Thanks.

Answer 1

I think you may have downloaded some malware with Madagascar. Word's Safe Mode is intended to block Word macro viruses. You might want to do some anti-malware scans.



There are never any guarantees in malware fighting, but try this:



If you have an anti-virus, make sure it has the latest virus definitions and run a full scan with it in Safe Mode with Networking. That often prevents malware from protecting itself. If you don’t have one, many people here swear by AVG (it’s free).



I suggest you also download Ad-Aware Free and Spybot S&D (they’re free), install them, update them and run full scans with them, again in Safe Mode With Networking.



Also, turn off System Restore to evict any copies of bad stuff that might be lurking there.



To get into Safe Mode with Networking:



1. Log out and reboot your machine.

2. When the machine starts the reboot sequence, press the F8 key repeatedly.

3. Select Safe Mode with Networking from the resulting menu.

4. Login. If the malware has changed your password, try logging in as Administrator. By default, Administrator has no password.

5. The machine will continue booting, but the Windows desktop will look different.

6. When you're finished doing what you need to do, log out and reboot back into normal mode.



Note that even if the anti-malware programs get rid of the malware, they may not be able to reverse the effects. Search the Web for possible fixes.



Update and run full scans regularly, not just when you think you already have malware.



Good luck.





Note: There ARE free versions of these programs on the websites listed. They just may not be obvious.



Ad-Aware Free (free): http://www.lavasoftusa.com/

Spybot S & D (free): http://www.spybot.com/



AVG anti-virus (free): http://free.grisoft.com/doc/2/lng/us/tpl/v5/

Avast! (free): http://www.avast.com/

Kaspersky (free trial) (Seems to dislike installing on any machine with just about any other decent anti-malware, including some firewalls.): http://usa.kaspersky.com/downloads/

MalwareBytes (free) http://www.malwarebytes.org/ (If the program doesn’t run, changing its filename from mbam.exe to something else ending in .exe has sometimes proven effective.)

Answer 2

The Blue Screen Usually indicates a Hardware malfunction, which can cause a series of issues and computer crashes. Which could be a factor in your Word program. Have you installed anything hardware wise recently? on older computers it could be alot of problems, usually with them you can just wipe the computer clean and reinstall windows which may or may not fix your problem but would definitly be a hassle especially if you dont want to lose any information. if you already tried reinstalling the word program you could try wiping it completely from registry and in the programs folder hope some of this helps.

Answer 3

in word delete the normal template and then try again - it can be found in C:\Documents and Settings\[user name]\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates