[jajclarke]

I have just added a new PC running XP Pro and Office 2003 to an existing peer-to-peer network, comprising 2 Win98 PC's and one other XPPro laptop. Everything is running fine, except that I can't open Office files in shared folders on the two Win98 PCs from the new XP PC. I either get an error message saying "Document name or path is not valid" (in Word) or nothing happens (Excel).

If I copy the files to the local drive of the new PC, I can open them fine. I can also open the same files with no problem across the network using my XP Pro laptop. Also, I can open other file types (eg .pdf) from the same network folders using the new XP machine. Only Office 2003 seems to be having the problem.

Any ideas how I fix it, please?

J

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Office 2003 cannot be installed on 98, so I guess it does not recognise the format, you would need Word on the 98 PC's

[Retired Tech]

Office 2003 cannot be installed on 98, so I guess it does not recognise the format, you would need Word on the 98 PC's

[jajclarke]

Thanks Keith, but maybe I wasn't clear. I am not trying to run Office 2003 on the Win 98 PCs. Those PCs already have compatible versions of Office running on them.

What I am trying to do is simply to open a Word document or Office spreadsheet that is stored in a shared folder on a Win98 PC, using the XP/Office 2003 PC.

I tried some experiments:

1. If I copy the same office documents to the XP laptop on the network, I can open them without problem using the new XP/Office2003 PC. They also open fine if I copy them to the new machine's own hard drive. Conclusion: the files themselves, or their format, or the version of Office they were created within, are not the cause of the problem.

2. I created a new Office document and copied to a folder on one of the Win 98 machine. I could not open it from the new XP/Office 2003 machine. Conclusion: again, Office version compatability is not the problem.

3. From the new PC, I can open pdf and other files stored in the same folder on
the Win 98 machine. Conclusion: Network problems are not to blame.

So it seems to be some problem involving the combination of Office 2003 and network file sharing.

Any more thoughts?

J