Large Publisher 2000 publication opens slowly in Publisher 2002 or 2003 (289010)


The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft Office Publisher 2003
  • Microsoft Publisher 2002
This article was previously published under Q289010

SYMPTOMS

When you open a very large Microsoft Publisher 2000 publication in Microsoft Office Publisher 2003 or Microsoft Publisher 2002, it may take much longer for the publication to open in Publisher 2002 than it does in Publisher 2000. For example, a 500-megabyte (MB) Publisher 2000 file may take over an hour to open in Office Publisher 2003 or Publisher 2002, and it may only take five minutes to open in Publisher 2000.

A very large publication may not open at all, and cause Publisher or your computer to stop responding.

CAUSE

This problem can occur when you open a publication that was created in a previous version of Publisher. The file must be converted to the Office Publisher 2003 format or the Publisher 2002 format. When a file is converted, it must first be read into memory and then converted before it is written to a disk. During the conversion process, your computer memory capacity must be at least twice the size of the original file because both the original file and the converted file are in memory until the file is written to the hard drive.

If the file is large enough to exhaust your computer's random access memory (RAM), it is stored in virtual memory (the swap file). Storing in the swap file takes much longer than storing in RAM. If the swap file is not large enough, the computer may stop responding.

RESOLUTION

To resolve this behavior, you can increase the size of your Windows swap file until it is at least twice the size of the Publisher 2000 file, open the Publisher 2000 publication and then save the publication in the Office Publisher 2003 format or Publisher 2002 format. These procedures are explained later in this article.

The Publisher 2002 format is typically only 40 % of the size of the same publication in the Publisher 2000 format, and conversion is no longer required to open the publication.

Although Windows dynamically changes the size of your swap file, the swap file requires contiguous disk space. Your swap file cannot be larger than the largest amount of contiguous disk space that you have, so a badly fragmented hard disk may not allow a very large swap file.

Before you can increase the size of your swap file, (dynamically or manually), you may have to defragment your hard drive.

To defragment your hard drive, follow the steps for your Windows operating system. To learn how to defragment the hard drive on your computer, follow these steps:
  1. Click Start, and then click Help.
  2. Search for the keyword "defragment" in Windows Help, and read the associated topics.
To manually increase the size of your swap file, follow these steps:

Note Because there are several versions of Microsoft Windows, the following steps may be different on your computer. If they are, see your product documentation to complete these steps.
  1. Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.
  2. In Control Panel, double-click System.
  3. In the System Properties dialog box, click the Performance tab.
  4. Click Virtual Memory.
  5. Click Let me specify my own virtual memory settings.
  6. In the Maximum box, enter a number that you want, and then click OK.
To save a Publisher 2000 publication as a Office Publisher 2003 or Publisher 2002 publication, follow these steps:
  1. Start Office Publisher 2003 or Publisher 2002, and then on the File menu, click Open.
  2. Locate the file that you want, and then click Open.
  3. On the File menu, click Save As.
  4. In the Save as type box, select Publisher Files.
  5. Name the file, and then click Save.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section.
Modification Type:MinorLast Reviewed:7/16/2004
Keywords:kbprb kbPerformance kbopenfile kbsavefile KB289010
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