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Windows 9x can be Low on Resources if programs use too much of a certain type of memory Windows allocates for its internal management.
I have a problem with Microsoft Word 2001 SR1. It ran ok until recently. On trying to open the program the pc hangs. Pressing ctrl-alt-del brings up a message saying "WARNING SYSTEM IS DANGEROUSLY LOW ON RESOURCES (which it is not) WOULD YOU LIKE TO TERMINATE MS WORD?" On clicking yes nothing happens. Pressing ctrl-alt-del eventually produces a blue screen then a restart. I am running Windows Me and have tried uninstalling/reinstalling several times. No other software has been installed recently.
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Well, to begin with, the 95/98/Me versions of Windows can most definition be low on resources even with plenty of memory.
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The question, of course, is why?
"Low on Resources" on a Windows 9x (meaning 95/98/Me) machine actually refers to a fixed size portion of memory that Windows allocates for certain objects that it has to keep track of. Since it's fixed size, it's unrelated to the actual amount of memory installed in your machine.
In practice, "Low on Resources" is typically the sign of a program bug. A program allocates many of these objects that Windows has to track, and fails to release them and the memory they consume is the most common cause of that problem.
So my initial reaction is to perform an up-to-date scan for spyware or viruses that may have infected your computer and eaten up resources. These programs are frequently quickly and poorly written, and often riddled with bugs.
You indicated that you uninstalled/reinstalled - those are good ideas. If the spyware / anti-virus check doesn't resolve the issue, that's exactly the tack I'd take. I'd start with a repair install of Office.
Article C2209 - October 21, 2004
Leo A. Notenboom has been playing with computers since he
was required to take a programming class in 1976. An 18 year career as a programmer at Microsoft soon followed.
After "retiring" in 2001, Leo started Ask Leo! in 2003 as a place for answers
to common computer and technical questions. More about Leo.
Just a note that normal.dot also holds many of your customizations - so if you blow it away, you may see many of the things you've tweaked in Word get restored to their defaults. Obviously if it's corrupt, you may have no alternative.
Posted by: Leo at September 11, 2005 9:23 PMThank you for resolving my problem. I was getting ready to go out and buy a new computer to save my business! You're the best!
Posted by: Lisa at May 2, 2006 11:36 AMI wish above comments will work next time i ancounter with such problem.what i do is just changed version of office.switch to 2000 if you have office xp & to 2000 if you have xp.It works all the time but i need some concrite solution,i think your ones will definitly work.
Posted by: utpal at October 28, 2006 2:34 AMi m using MS Office 2003, when i open ms word, my system hangs. my system is very fast, 40 gb hard disk and 224 mb RAM, 2.19 GHZ... problem lies only with ms word opening. others ms excel, access working in a rite manner. i give print command from word and system hangs for almost 10 minutes and prints come out after 15 minutes. pls help me. i have format all my drives and make partitions again but this dont solve the problem. i m usign symentac antivirus
Posted by: H. Adeel at June 4, 2009 9:27 PMHello to all,
I have solved the problem with Excel crashing. I did not have to re-install Excel or Windows 98. Here is the detail of the problem, below, and the FIX! I wanted to share this with everybody. Read on!
Note: I have Windows 98, 2nd Edition Q239887 update (latest).
My Problem:
When I open an Excel file and click on the Print Preview button and then click the “Close” button I get the following error message:
“EXCEL caused a general protection fault in module USER.EXE at 0006:000056f4”.
Other times, when I open Excel and then to close Excel, I get the following error message:
“The system is dangerously low on resources. Would you like to terminate the following application?
• explorer"
When I click yes, I repeatedly get the same error message with the following applications listed in succession:
• Imgicon
• Systray
• Adusermon
• Cgmenu
• Cg16eh
• Cg32eh
Upon Google searching on these error messages, I found the following solutions, which I have tried AND IT WORKS!!!!
Problem: EXCEL caused a general protection fault in module USER.EXE at 003:00003d32. (Similar error to mine).
Fix: Open windows explorer. Do a search for "*.xlb" without the quotes. When the file is found, delete this file. Now open up Excel. The .xlb file is your menu settings. When you reopen excel, it will create a new .xlb file.
When I did a file search for *.xlb, only one file turned up, which was found under C:\WINDOWS\. In my case, the file name was “PII 3508.xlb”.
I tried it… this worked! Awesome!
Now, it's on to trying to figure out my music software glitch.
John
Posted by: John at August 26, 2009 7:55 PM