How to open Excel docs default with Excel 2007?

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ucdcrush@gmail.com - 06 Jul 2006 17:24 GMT

I had Office 2003 installed, then installed Office 2007 as well. The
system was automatically configured then to open all Excel files (2003
or 2007) in Excel 2007.

However, here at work they just did some Office 2003 update, and now
XLS files are opening with Office 2003. If I go into Windows explorer
and to file types and find XLS, when I browse to the office 12
directory and select EXCEL.EXE as the file used to open, it simply
selects the "Microsoft Excel" that's already in the "Recommended
Programs" section (at the top) of the "Which program to open the file
with?" dialog box, which is Excel 2003.

I even tried fooling it by renaming the excel 2003 EXCEL.EXE file, but
it found it and renamed it back.

Is there some way to set it so that Excel 2007 opens all XLS files?
Thanks

Reply to this Message

Harlan Grove - 06 Jul 2006 19:52 GMT

ucdcrush@gmail.com wrote...
...

>I even tried fooling it by renaming the excel 2003 EXCEL.EXE file, but
>it found it and renamed it back.

That's a Windows XP 'feature' which ensures the availability of certain
files.

>Is there some way to set it so that Excel 2007 opens all XLS files?

Yes, but I have to ask whether your employer wants you to be using
Excel 2007 by default. If you share workbook files with others using
only Excel 2003, you shouldn't be using Excel 2007 with shared files.

If your company's IT department wants you to be using Excel 2007, they
should be able to help you with this. If not, unclear whether anyone
else should, but FTHOI you'd need to use Explorer's menu command Tools

> Folder Options... to display the Folder Options dialog, select the File Types tab in that dialog, select Excel each file type separately, click on the Advanced button to display the Edit File Type dialog, select the Open action, click on the Edit button to display the Editing action for file type:... dialog, make the necessary changes in the application pathname to point to Excel 2007 rather than Excel 2003, click OK, then click OK in the Edit File Type dialog as well. Tedious but possible.

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Dave Peterson - 06 Jul 2006 20:06 GMT

First, I don't use xl2007, so this may not work.

But when other people have asked how to get a specific version of excel to be
the windows default version of excel, this usually works...

The last version installed or registered is the "owner" of .xls files.

You can reregister excel with by doing something like:

close all running instances of excel
windows start button|Run
c:\path\to\excel2007.exe /unregserver
followed by
c:\path\to\excel2007.exe /regserver

Again, this works with older versions of excel--I'm not sure how windows/xl2007
will react.

> I had Office 2003 installed, then installed Office 2007 as well. The
> system was automatically configured then to open all Excel files (2003
[quoted text clipped - 13 lines]
> Is there some way to set it so that Excel 2007 opens all XLS files?
> Thanks

Signature

Dave Peterson

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ucdcrush@gmail.com - 06 Jul 2006 20:47 GMT

> First, I don't use xl2007, so this may not work.
>
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
> followed by
> c:\path\to\excel2007.exe /regserver

Thanks for the reply Dave. I tried it and it didn't work. Maybe I'll
try a "repair" of Office 2007 and see if that fixes anything.

Reply to this Message

Nick Hodge - 06 Jul 2006 20:56 GMT

That should fix it....check the reset shortcuts option

Signature

HTH
Nick Hodge
Microsoft MVP - Excel
Southampton, England
www.nickhodge.co.uk
nick_hodgeTAKETHISOUT@zen.co.uk.ANDTHIS

>> First, I don't use xl2007, so this may not work.
>>
[quoted text clipped - 14 lines]
> Thanks for the reply Dave. I tried it and it didn't work. Maybe I'll
> try a "repair" of Office 2007 and see if that fixes anything.

Reply to this Message

ucdcrush@gmail.com - 11 Jul 2006 19:52 GMT

Yep, running the repair fixed it. Clicking on "repair" never brought up
any options though, it just worked for 5-10 minutes then wanted to
reboot.

> That should fix it....check the reset shortcuts option
>
[quoted text clipped - 24 lines]
> > Thanks for the reply Dave. I tried it and it didn't work. Maybe I'll
> > try a "repair" of Office 2007 and see if that fixes anything.

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