Clipboard problem in Excel 2016

Anonymous

I am running Excel 2016 on a Windows 10 Machine.

When I copy a cell (or cut a cell, or move a cell) I get one of two error messages:

"Cannot open the Clipboard"

"We couldn't free up space on the Clipboard. Another program might be using it right now."

I am then able to successfully paste what Excel told me it could not copy. To restate for clarity...Excel throws error messages, but I am able to successfully copy and paste.

The problem is that it throws the error messages every single time I try and copy or cut or whatever.

Things I have tried:

I've ensured all other programs are not running (or using the clip board)

I've cleared the %temp% folder

I've cleared the Clipboard within Excel

Word does not have this problem...

Please help.

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Anonymous

Hello,

I have an update on this error dialog: “There's a problem with the clipboard, but you can still paste your content within this workbook."

When Excel shows this dialog after a copy (CTRL+C) action, it means that another app has a lock on the system clipboard. In this situation you can still paste within Excel. However you cannot paste to another app like Word or Outlook which uses the clipboard.

Last year we made some improvements to Office365 users so that this error message only shows once per Excel instance. This is based on customer feedback - the design change prevents it popping up multiple successive times when the clipboard is locked. We have also considered never showing the error dialog, but there was user feedback that this message is informative and helpful in some cases.

We hope this helps shed some light on this error message. For any design suggestions or new ideas on improving the Excel copy-paste experience, please post to Excel UserVoice.

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255 additional answers

Anonymous

2017-07-28T14:03:05+00:00

Here's a new wrinkle. I was telling my wife about this problem and she says she sees it a lot on her work computer. Thing is, she's running Windows 7 and Office 2010. Now, how can that be? When I had a Win 7 computer running Office 2010 this never happened. Didn't happen when I upgraded to 2013. She says it's been going on for about a year. Same here. A year or so.
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Anonymous

2017-07-28T13:48:10+00:00

I have had this problem for months. Done everything I found in this thread. The problem went away briefly after an earlier update, but then came back even worse than before. Latest issue is when I copy from one book to another, I cannot select a cell in the new book. Only way I can paste is to save the target book, reopen it, and then paste. Other times it pastes old clipboard data. Occasionally it will actually paste what I want. Usually I get the "There's a problem with the clipboard" message.

I'm on 1706 Build 8229.2103. Microsoft clearly has no intention of fixing these serious bugs. I swear, I need to go back to Office 2013 and Windows 7. Things worked then.
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Anonymous

2017-07-27T07:28:04+00:00

No clue. I know there are differences between Professional 2016 and 365, but not to wich extend.

Look at my posts from March 3rd and July 10th.

Maybe the explanation there helps you to find the trigger or do something about it.
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Anonymous

2017-07-26T15:49:22+00:00

UweHa,

Just checked my Microsoft Office 365 Subscription & have the following;

Version 1706 (Build 8229.2103 Click-to-Run)

Current Channel

Used Excel this morning and the first this that happened was a problem with the clipboard doing a copy/paste.

Wish this would get fixed.
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