Excel cannot complete the task with available resources. Choose less data or close applications.

Anonymous
2010-05-05T14:25:22+00:00

Excel cannot complete the task with available resources. Choose less data or close applications. the size of the file is 640MB with over 250k records. I have 3.25GB of memory. It takes 5 mintues for the file to open.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Excel | For home | Windows

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Anonymous
2011-09-07T15:07:34+00:00

I have been experiencing this problem for months (i.e., Excel cannot complete the task with available resources. Choose less data or close applications).  I am running Windows 7 and Office 2010.  The problem can occur with very small spreadsheets so it has nothing to do with the complexity of the spreadsheets.  After reading the other posts, especially the one from Chuthor, I began to suspect incompatibilities between Excel and other MS software that I've downloaded.

Anyway, I just uninstalled Windows Live Essentials and Microsoft Outlook Social Connector for Live Messenger, which came with an update from Microsoft on 4/7/2011.  This appears to have solved the problem.

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Anonymous
2012-04-09T18:19:33+00:00

We eventually opened a ticket with Microsoft. Apparently this is on their radar, with no real fix just this work around. The users were experiencing this error daily, and by disabling preview pane in the 3 necessar locations completly fixed the issue. Here is the workaround MS sent me.

Windows 7 is new with Preview/Details panes. These Preview/Details panes contribute to the "Available resources" issues, as well as our "Locked for Editing by another user" issues. We consider turning them off in these 3 locations as a valid test:

Windows:

1. Right click on Start Ribbon.

2. Click Open Windows Explorer.

3. Click Organize | Layout  |

4. Uncheck Details Pane and Preview Pane.

Excel:

1. Click File | Open.

2. Click Organize | Layout  |

3. Uncheck Details Pane and Preview Pane.

Outlook:

1. Open a new e-mail.

2. In the "Include" group, click Attach File.

3. Click Organize | Layout  |

4. Uncheck Details Pane and Preview Pane.

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  1. Anonymous
    2011-02-15T19:59:50+00:00

    I too am having this same problem daily (3-5 times per day). It started in the late summer 2010. It got so bad that the IT department purchased me a new laptop as well as installing MS 2010 on the new system. After a few days it started up again!

    It has no rhyme or reason as to why it does it. I can have just Outlook and Excel open with one workbook open. It also happens when trying to open an attachment in Outlook.  It happens with 1 or 10 spreadsheets open. It doesn't matter the size or number of applications currently running; the error message is always the same:

    Excel cannot complete this task with available resources. Choose less data or close other applications.

    I have a powerful ThinkPad with 4.00 GB of RAM with a processor speed of 2.40 GHz. The only way to solve the problem is save my current work, close Excel and reopen again, and all is fine until the error randomly pops up again.

    This is becoming very frustrating (and costly, with my company buying a new system) as I lose productivity and man hours each time I have to shut down and reopen the Excel program again.

    I haven’t experienced this error with any other program except Excel. I have worked on a PowerPoint Presentation that was over 100 MB and never received this error message, so I’m convinced this is some kind of Excel bug that MS has yet to figure out.

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  2. Anonymous
    2011-02-02T12:33:13+00:00

    Why are you not responding to the guys below?  I have been using various versions of Office for years, have relatively small files and i get this message many times a day since last fall. Please give us the courtesy of a proper answer - nothing you suggest works. Did MS do a version change in the fall which messed  us up?

    because they don't give a s**t about guys below. I do have the same problem, nobody can help me. Thank you Microsuck oh sorry I meant microsoft [but cannot delete now delete button not working]

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  3. Anonymous
    2011-01-27T13:43:00+00:00

    Why are you not responding to the guys below?  I have been using various versions of Office for years, have relatively small files and i get this message many times a day since last fall. Please give us the courtesy of a proper answer - nothing you suggest works. Did MS do a version change in the fall which messed  us up?

    Was this answer helpful?

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