"there's a problem with the clipboard, but you can still paste this content within this workbook"

Anonymous
2016-11-17T14:55:36+00:00

Perhaps someone could direct to a discussion where this has been tackled, but I keep getting this error "there's a problem with the clipboard, but you can still past this content within this workbook " with simple cut/copy and paste actions in Excel.  The error box pops up and an alert sounds (which is super annoying) after every paste.  I can still perform the actions however my selection is not highlighted and I can't be sure that I have selected the correct information until I do a paste in the same, or another, worksheet. I have Excel 2016 in Office 365 on a machine running Windows 10.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Excel | For home | Windows

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Anonymous
2017-02-28T16:18:43+00:00

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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  1. Anonymous
    2019-01-09T23:19:36+00:00

    The comment above stating that "may work for Windows 7, but does not work for Windows 10" is absolutely incorrect, at least for the three Windows 10 PCs that I use regularly. Since I originally made my post regarding this issue every platform has been running the contemporary version of windows 10 (currently one is running 1803 and the two that I use most are running 1809) and Office 365.

    With this configuration, none of these platforms ever display this message more than once if I keep any Excel file open continuously. On a normal day I always use at least 6 to 10 different Excel files some of which contain multiple macros and some that don't.

    To change this option see below.

    Office Options - The General tab

    To see general options for working with your Office applications on Windows, click File > Options > General.

    In the User Interface Options section simply uncheck Enable Lime Preview.

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  2. Anonymous
    2019-01-10T04:35:06+00:00

    I am running Windows 10, and Office 365.  Two points I'd make:

    1)  I DO NOT want to disable Live Preview.  I use it often, and very much like it.

    1. I tried the "fix"anyway, just to see if it would fix my problem.  It did not.

    I will try the "Repair" fix mentioned in other posts here, and see if that works, when I get time.

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  3. Anonymous
    2019-01-10T15:15:21+00:00

    The comment above stating that "may work for Windows 7, but does not work for Windows 10" is absolutely incorrect, at least for the three Windows 10 PCs that I use regularly. 

    There's a contradiction in your reply.  You say my statement is "absolutely" incorrect, but then allow that you can only vouch for the 3 Windows 10 systems that you use.  I have tried shutting off live preview (in fact I've left it turned off) but it did NOT help to solve the problem on my machine.  This fix worked for you.  Running various fixes worked for other people.  But if you are paying attention then you see that there are MANY people still on this thread who have not yet stumbled on a solution that works.  Thus my comment about MS not having a clue as to what is really going on with this bug.  This is now a 3 year old thread...

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  4. Anonymous
    2019-01-10T18:13:12+00:00

    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.

    I get the same error message multiple times when trying to copy and past in the same Excel spreadsheet.  Is there a way to disable the message?

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