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
    2013-01-15T16:54:37+00:00

    Chip,

    Thank you very much for your insight and expertise.  I've had this issue numerous times with an XLSX file size of 16 megs.  Of all the solutions I've read or tried, this one worked!  Simply by saving the file as an XLS, the file size dropped to 6 megs and I was finally able to delete an empty row.  I appreciate you taking the time to share.

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  2. Anonymous
    2013-05-07T02:23:55+00:00

    This worked wonders! Tks.

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  3. Anonymous
    2013-05-21T16:26:34+00:00

    Excel cannot complete this task with available resources (Excel Error Solution)

    May 16, 2012

    By admin of spice for windows 8 and excel 2010

    I routinely do fairly complex things with files with over a hundred thousand rows with formulas. I thought i’d finally broken Excel when I got this error while working with such a file:

    Excel cannot complete this task with available resources.

    The truth is, Excel can complete the task with the resources, you just need to remove an update that Microsoft sent you with the intent of blocking some malicious code. This update is Titled: security update for Microsoft Excel 2010 (KB2597).

    To fix this problem, navigate to Installed Updates which lives in this folder: Control Panel\Programs\Programs and Features

    Search for KB2597166 as you see in the photo below, right click and remove/uninstall and back to your Excel work, nerd.

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