Excel Worksheet and backups suddenly get Unreadable Content Message

I have a 400 line Excel 2007 single worksheet spreadsheet.

Each row has a Comment inserted in one of the cells. The Comment has been formatted as follows: "Size" has been adjusted, "Colors and Lines" has been adjusted by choosing "Color", "Fill Effects", "Picture", "Select Picture" and a .jpg file from a certain folder is selected.

The result is that when I hover over this cell in any given row, the .jpg file that was placed in the Comment appears.  There are other simple text comments in several other cells in the worksheet.

This all was working fine for me for several months, and I was making backups just to be safe.

Suddenly, I started getting "Excel found unreadable content in..."  and it offered me to "recover the contents of this workbook". When I choose to recover, I get my entire worksheet back without any comments (ones with .jpgs and ones without), and I am told "Excel was able to open the file by repairing or removing the unreadable content".

I also get a chance to view the "log file" and this is its contents:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes" ?>

**-** <recoveryLog xmlns="**http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/spreadsheetml/2006/main**">

**** <logFileName>error053200_01.xml</logFileName>

**** <summary>Errors were detected in file 'C:\Users\Bruce Kay\Desktop\Documents\DOCUMENTS ON iPhone\All Casino Chip Collection.xlsx'</summary>

**-** <removedParts summary="Following is a list of removed parts:">

**** <removedPart>Removed Part: /xl/drawings/vmlDrawing1.vml part. (Drawing shape)</removedPart>

**** </removedParts>

**** </recoveryLog>

The same thing happens with all of my backups of this sheet, and those were backups of working versions of this sheet.

This is all unbelievably frustrating.

Does anyone think this was due to an automatic update by Microsoft?

Do you have any suggestions for recovery?

Thanks

Hey BKayNJ,

I had this issue too and didn't know what was causing it - It was frustrating because all that work was gone and it happened to me twice already.

Were you working on multiple worksheets?

My guess is that you were....

If you are - one or more of the worksheet is bugged.  If you aren't then that worksheet that you are working on is bugged and you need to recreate the file again on a clean excel.

Here is how I was able to reproduce the error, find the worksheet that was bugged and was able to fix it

1. Open the file and that error will appear after you click "yes" ("Excel found unreadable content in..."  and it offered me to "recover the contents of this workbook".)
2. Re-Save that file after closing the error message (under another file name if you want).
3. Open that new file and that error message shouldn't appear

IF IT THE ERROR MESSAGE DOESN'T APPEAR

4. Select one worksheet and have that as your main and control variable
5. Copy an existing picture comment and paste it to "ONE" of the other worksheet
6. Save the file again (in another file name if you choose to)
7. Open it up again and if you see the error - that is the worksheet where the bug is located.  BUT if you DON'T see the error then that mean that the worksheet is not bugged.
8. If you don't see the error - keep repeating the steps from 4 to 7 until you open the workbook and experience that error.
9. If you didn't happen to find it then it could be that the worksheet that you selected as your control and main (where you copy the picture comment from) is the one that is bugged.

The way I fixed it was removing that worksheet from the workbook and creating a whole new one in a clean excel then merging them together.

I hope this helps but I was facing the same problem and error but was able to reproduce my error and knew what was causing mine.

Good Luck everyone

• JOHN 7L

Hey BKayNJ,

I had this issue too and didn't know what was causing it - It was frustrating because all that work was gone and it happened to me twice already.

Were you working on multiple worksheets?

My guess is that you were....

If you are - one or more of the worksheet is bugged.  If you aren't then that worksheet that you are working on is bugged and you need to recreate the file again on a clean excel.

Here is how I was able to reproduce the error, find the worksheet that was bugged and was able to fix it

1. Open the file and that error will appear after you click "yes" ("Excel found unreadable content in..."  and it offered me to "recover the contents of this workbook".)
2. Re-Save that file after closing the error message (under another file name if you want).
3. Open that new file and that error message shouldn't appear

IF IT THE ERROR MESSAGE DOESN'T APPEAR

4. Select one worksheet and have that as your main and control variable
5. Copy an existing picture comment and paste it to "ONE" of the other worksheet
6. Save the file again (in another file name if you choose to)
7. Open it up again and if you see the error - that is the worksheet where the bug is located.  BUT if you DON'T see the error then that mean that the worksheet is not bugged.
8. If you don't see the error - keep repeating the steps from 4 to 7 until you open the workbook and experience that error.
9. If you didn't happen to find it then it could be that the worksheet that you selected as your control and main (where you copy the picture comment from) is the one that is bugged.

The way I fixed it was removing that worksheet from the workbook and creating a whole new one in a clean excel then merging them together.

I hope this helps but I was facing the same problem and error but was able to reproduce my error and knew what was causing mine.

Good Luck everyone

• JOHN 7L

I realize this post is a couple years old but it seems active and I did not see an answer. Setting the shape to the default properties before removing the comment seems to work for me.

With Selection

.Comment.Shape.SetShapesDefaultProperties

.ClearComments

End With

It is a mega frustrating problem which I waisted a lot of time, rebuilding the spreadsheets only

to have the same problem. This is unresolved for a couple of years now.

I eventually abandoned the project.

I don't have confidence in new Microsoft software, You pay for ms office and its bugged.

Even a long lived prog such as Ms Paint is now an unstable piece of software. I give up with MSoft.

Open office is free.

Thanks. Yeah, I was able to keep the problem from recurring by copying to a new workbook (knock wood) but I wasn't able to recover the work that got corrupted.