Word cannot complete the operation because too many files open

Anonymous
2011-08-08T18:05:14+00:00

I've upgraded to Lion and am now having this error message every time Word 2011 tries to auto save:

word cannot complete the operation because too many files open

I click OK and then it says:

Word is unable to save the AutoRecover file in the location you have specified. Make sure that you have specified a valid location for AutoRecover files in Preferences, and that you have permission to write files to the location you specified.

I've tried changing the location for autosave and also made sure that the folder has read/write privileges for all users. I've done some Googling and not been able to find any other references to this problem since 2004ish.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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Anonymous
2017-06-19T13:34:35+00:00

You should have added "for me" because that solution did work for at least 18 other users.

So let's try this, which I'm surprised we did not suggest before. It's called a safe boot. It's a simple procedure that will attempt to load in your Mac only software, add-ins, fonts, etc. etc. that are official versions of Apple software and other approved vendors. If Word works, it probably means that some software is interfering with it (i.e. software that was not allowed to execute under safe boot conditions).

  • Shut down you Mac
  • Turn it on
  • As soon as you hear the initial "boing" sound, press Shift (that's Apple's instructions; I press is as soon as I see the screen turn on)
  • Hold it down until you see the Finder and it seems to stop loading

Once the Finder loads, test Word. If it works, the problem is caused by non-Apple software added to your user account or your Mac.

There is a similar procedure involving the creation of a brand new user. This ensures the user does not have any additional stuff in their account. You could try that and then test word from that new user.

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  1. Anonymous
    2017-06-18T19:02:48+00:00

    repair permissions does not solve this problem

    OSX 10.11.6

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-08-21T02:18:00+00:00

    >> We must be dumb (and my IT engineer too)

    You've said that a couple of times already. Since you find no significant difference between one million hits and one hundred instances, I'm feeling inclined to believe you. (Should have added a smiley here.)

    In case you're wondering, MVPs are not affiliated to MS; we are Office users just like you, except we answer questions as a hobby. After volunteering answers to our fellow users for a couple of years, they offer you an MVP badge. By then, we no longer laugh at wisecracks on Ballmer, Gates and Customer Care—we've seen too many of them.

    Lastly, if we had a sure-fire solution, we'd have given it to you.

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  3. Anonymous
    2015-08-20T08:47:19+00:00

    We must be dumb (and my IT engineer too), because on dozens of machines since 1998, I get this infamous memory message every month since I use Office, and no turnaround (I know several of them) ever worked.

    We use CC 2015, Acrobat, Quark, etc., which are hungry in memory, without a glitch. 

    And when I still lost time to call abysmal Microsoft customer care, they said they never heard of it.

    Kremlin, I said…

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  4. Anonymous
    2015-08-20T05:15:04+00:00

    When the number of hits matters, you should not search without enclosing phrases in quotation marks. As it stands, you are only searching for web pages containing those seven words. By page 10 of the Google results you are already getting errant results like "Not enough system memory for audio buffers."

    In addition, there is a difference between the results reported by Google France and Google.com. The latter reports over 300,000 users solved their problem and erased their complaints since the time you posted.

    Surely that's not true. The only truth is that Google estimates the number of pages containing your search terms, but it's been wildly wrong since forever. If I access page 25 of my results, the number of hits goes down violently.

    A more reasonable search would be:

    This of course only locates pages addressing the issue using those phrases (plus their synonyms), but they are closer to being relevant.

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