Excel 2013 starts up with blank screen when opened from explorer

Anonymous
2013-02-27T17:34:15+00:00

When I double click any Excel file in windows explorer, Excel starts up maximized and I can see the ribbon but the whole grid area where my data should be is blank, no gridlines or row/column headers.   If I "restore down" the Excel window then everything appears as normal.

I sometimes get subsequent Excel crashes.

I also get an Excel crash by clicking on an Excel file in windows explorer, as if to preview it.  The Excel file preview function is not working since I installed Office 2013 Professional.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Excel | For home | Windows

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  1. Anonymous
    2014-09-05T12:20:24+00:00

    In  the wrong place

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  2. Anonymous
    2014-09-09T18:12:43+00:00

    To fix this issue I first removed my "personal.xlsb" file as indicated in other posts then went to the "Uninstall or Change a Program" section in the Control Panel.  Selected Microsoft Office 365 and clicked on the "Change" button.  Then I selected "Online Repair" and clicked REPAIR.  This went through the setup again and fixed this issue.  (Doing the Quick Repair option did not work for me)

    Problem Solved.

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-09-11T10:32:51+00:00

    Hi,

    I have a similar issue including with the error "There was a problem sending the command to the program".  I got rid of the error by applying a registry change as suggested in another thread.

    But still had the problem that the file does not actually open (only Excel) when I double click it.

    I followed all of the above steps (where applicable). I even created a new Windows account to see if it was a profile issue. The new account has the same issue.

    As a last step I tried the online repair. This led did not only not help, but made the error pop up again.

    You mention that the last step should be uninstall an reinstall. Does this mean all my Office setting for all the office applications (like Outlook) will be lost?

    Thanks,

    Bruce

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  4. Anonymous
    2014-09-11T11:00:18+00:00

    BTW. I tried full uninstall on reinstall... this did not help.

    Using Windows 8.1

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  5. Anonymous
    2014-09-11T19:26:17+00:00

    There's a fix available that will resolve one of these blank screen scenarios.  If you're using Microsoft User Experience Virtualization (UE-V) and receiving the error "There was a problem sending a command to the program" make sure you have the latest updates installed for UE-V.  There's a UE-V Hotfix for this specific issue available at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2927019.  If you're not using UE-V, there're additional reported solutions to the blank screen experience in this article as well: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2994633

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