Excel 2011 version 14.4.8 running on an iMac gets "out of memory" messages.

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Level 1

9 points

Excel 2011 version 14.4.8 running on an iMac gets "out of memory" messages.

HELP!!! Excel 2011 running on an iMac with OS 10.10.2 and 16GB Ram gets "out of memory" messages. When I monitor processes with "Activity Monitor", I am using less than half of my RAM. The Excel workbook has many sheets and also some macros. The basic workbook has been running for about two and half years starting in August 2012 without any problems until I upgraded to Yosemite in early December 2014. Now I often have to restore the entire file content because it gets corrupted after not being able to save the file because of the "out of memory" message. I can take a file and its content that ran fine a year ago and run it today and it will eventually get corrupted and get the "Out of memory" message after saving/quitting/re-opening the file any where from 6 to 15 to 25 times. I think I need to have more memory allocated to Excel, but Yosemite doesn't provide any way for the user to interact with the memory management process. I have also experienced the very same problem on my MacBook Pro that runs Yosemite. I have worked file/path name length issues, closely inspected the macros that normally don't run except when activated with a user pressed button, and made sure I don't have any weird links within the workbook or even links to another file outside the workbook. This problem seems to get worse as a continue to fill up the spread sheet with more financial data. This Excel workbook is used to manage my club's finances; I am the club treasurer. I have searched the internet for clues about similar problems and have found none!

My iMac is a 27-inch, Late 2009 with a 2.8GHz Intel Core i7 Processor. It includes 16GB of 1067 MHz DDR3 RAM. The hard drive is a fussed 1TB rotating HD with 128 GB SSD. This hardware has been running for about 27 months. I am a very advanced Mac user that programs Excel and Filemaker and repairs Macs for others.

iMac, OS X Yosemite (10.10.2), I also have a MBP & Mac Mini

Posted on Mar 4, 2015 12:29 PM

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Answer 1

Mar 4, 2015 12:38 PM in response to raharris40

I am a very advanced Mac user that programs Excel and Filemaker and repairs Macs for others.

I am a not a very advanced Mac user that uses programs like Excel and Filemaker and avoids any repairs of Macs for others

🙂

Given the caveat, have you tried reinstall of Office? Your MS Office 2011 may have become corrupted. After upgrading to Yosemite I had to reinstall my Office 2011. No crashes.

The current version of Office 2011 is 14.4.8.

First - find your Office 2011 install disc with the product key # - and only then remove Office according to MS instructions

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2398768

Or go here to DianefromOregon's site for help removing Office 2011:

http://www.officeformachelp.com/2012/12/office-for-mac-2011-remove-office/

Then Reinstall from DVD

Then enter your Product #

After successfully reinstalling Office 2011, update your Office product using the Software update within Office called Microsoft Update or going to the Help menu within Word or Excel or PowerPoint and select Update.

It may take a few times before you get to final upgrade to current Office version.

It should be 14.4.8 as of current date.

How to locate product keys

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2279109

or here on locating product keys

http://office.about.com/od/MicrosoftOfficeMac/a/Best-3-Ways-To-Find-Microsoft-Of fice-For-Mac-Key-Codes.htm

Note is updated as of March 4, 2015

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Answer 2

raharris40 Author

Level 1

9 points

Mar 4, 2015 1:01 PM in response to Sparkleberry

I forgot to mention in my original posting that I did uninstall Office 2011 and completely re-install it early in my trouble shooting process. This did not change the situation at all. My uninstall process was to go into my system and user libraries and trash anything that had a Microsoft label, trash the applications, then empty the trash. Finally I used "EasyFind" to find all other Microsoft files and trashed them. After doing all this, I pulled my original install disk and re-installed Office 2011. I upgraded it to 14.4.1 and tried that and had similar bad experiences; finally I upgraded to the latest 14.4.8. This process did not yield any insight into the problem.

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Answer 3

Mar 4, 2015 1:18 PM in response to raharris40

I see. I know you are an experienced user but did you follow the steps suggested here? MS does place a lot of stuff in lots of places.

http://www.officeformachelp.com/2012/12/office-for-mac-2011-remove-office/

My uninstall process was to go into my system and user libraries and trash anything that had a Microsoft label, trash the applications, then empty the trash. Finally I used "EasyFind" to find all other Microsoft files and trashed them.

Which if you did remove it completely and did a clean install that means that something else is going on.

Edit:

Afterthought - cleaning temporary files as well as copying the worksheet(s) over into a new document and saving that as a new file has helped me in the past. Worksheets can become corrupted, even balloon in size.

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Answer 4

raharris40 Author

Level 1

9 points

Mar 4, 2015 1:47 PM in response to Sparkleberry

This idea of copying the worksheet over into a new document certainly has merit. I will have to ponder on this. In my case this isn't very straight forward since I have programmed Excel with buttons and macros to do some time-saving chores consistently.

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Answer 5

Mar 4, 2015 1:49 PM in response to raharris40

I can only imagine how much work that might entail.

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Answer 6

raharris40 Author

Level 1

9 points

Mar 6, 2015 12:10 PM in response to Sparkleberry

I have discovered that I am running the student version of 2011 Office for the Mac and that it seems to have a built in limit for the number of "Saves" that you can make with any one file. I estimate that in the two and one-half years that i have been running this Excel program/file that I have saved it about 500 times. I think that is about the built in limit. In the course of trouble shooting I went back several months of the archived files and ran cycles of opening-saving-closing the file and found the farther back I go the larger the number before Excel stops letting me save any more because "out of memory" message. I took the file to my friend who had Office 2010 Home and Student version for Windows and ran many cycles on his windows computer and never ran up against a problem. I brought the saved version of the file back to my Mac and I had no further problems. My theory is that the process of saving the file on a Windows version of Office reset this built in counter within the file; I think I should get another 500 save cycles before encountering the problem again.

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Answer 7

Mar 6, 2015 12:21 PM in response to raharris40

raharris40 wrote:

I have discovered that I am running the student version of 2011 Office for the Mac and that it seems to have a built in limit for the number of "Saves" that you can make with any one file. I estimate that in the two and one-half years that i have been running this Excel program/file that I have saved it about 500 times. I think that is about the built in limit. In the course of trouble shooting I went back several months of the archived files and ran cycles of opening-saving-closing the file and found the farther back I go the larger the number before Excel stops letting me save any more because "out of memory" message. I took the file to my friend who had Office 2010 Home and Student version for Windows and ran many cycles on his windows computer and never ran up against a problem. I brought the saved version of the file back to my Mac and I had no further problems. My theory is that the process of saving the file on a Windows version of Office reset this built in counter within the file; I think I should get another 500 save cycles before encountering the problem again.

Hi, raharris

I have a vague recollection of reading about a limit on the number of file saves but cannot find anything on it right now. Looks like you will have to change the name.

Speaking of which, semi related issue is the total file naming length, including the full path. See this tech note here from MS. That was an issue that cropped up for me some years ago.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/213983

"Make sure that the path to the file contains fewer than 219 characters."

That is easy to exceed when you get carried away naming directories and subdirectories.

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Answer 8

raharris40 Author

Level 1

9 points

Mar 6, 2015 12:35 PM in response to Sparkleberry

I discovered this file path name limitation during my troubleshooting and thought that this was the problem. My original file path name had about 242 characters with considering delimiters. I reduced it to 199 characters. This did not change the issue at all. I'm not sure that the 219 character limit is real, but I will keep this matter under control as I move forward.

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