Large Excel Files

[zynder]

Hi guys!

I have a shared workbook up to 10-20 users. This is the first time we encountered this problem. Basically the excel file size range from 2-4 MB. But yesterday it bloated up to 150 MB - 350 MB.

OMG!!!

How can I shrink the excel file back to normal. I've tried un sharing the workbook and it didn't help.

Thanks for any input!

[RhinoBull]

... But yesterday it bloated up to 150 MB - 350 MB.

How did that happen? I would Try to find out the cause first by talking to your users.

[Hack]

I had that happen to me once, and I never did figure out why.

I made a copy of the spreadsheet, then went into the originial, deleted EVERYTHING out of it and saved it.

The file size didn't change a single KB

I wound up opening a blank worksheet, and copying what I had over to it. That was the only way I got the size back down to normal.

I even posted this very same question here on the Forums. Nothing anyone suggested helped or fixed it.

[Hack]

Here is the thread that I created on this issue back in 2005. Read some of the responses.

[zynder]

Thanks for the quick replies.

Excel is weird. Anyway, just for additional info, im using office 2003 running on XP pro under 2003 domain.

The excel file is shared. Anyway, I can only get the size back if i copy and paste it to another instance of excel and then delete the large excel file but what the heck is making it large.

[RhinoBull]

I think the "weird" behavior can somehow be explained (I guess)...

If someone mistakenly (by pressing ctrl+a and then ctrl+c) copied 10K rows from one spreadsheet to another and then by realizing that that was a mistake can do either:

- hide "bad" spreadsheet so nobody would "see" it
- or re-paste only necessary rows by overwiting all of those 10Ks and I think Excel may remember all deleted rows since it's [basically] single file based db (just like ms access but without the db cleanup utility).

I'm guessing here of course as I haven't seen any documentation (if such even exists).

[Hack]

The excel file is shared. Anyway, I can only get the size back if i copy and paste it to another instance of excel and then delete the large excel file but what the heck is making it large.

Yep, as I said, that is what I had to do, and, two years later, I still don't know what happened to the spreadsheet file.

I was also using Excel 2003 BTW.

[zynder]

I read your thread and still their suggestions dont seem to work. I even downloaded the add-in and still don't have any luck. The empty excel file is 13MB OMG...

[zynder]

I think the "weird" behavior can somehow be explained (I guess)...

If someone mistakenly (by pressing ctrl+a and then ctrl+c) copied 10K rows from one spreadsheet to another and then by realizing that that was a mistake can do either:

- hide "bad" spreadsheet so nobody would "see" it
- or re-paste only necessary rows by overwiting all of those 10Ks and I think Excel may remember all deleted rows since it's [basically] single file based db (just like ms access but without the db cleanup utility).

I'm guessing here of course as I haven't seen any documentation (if such even exists).

It could be but I deleted the excess rows and column but the size is still big. The file is basically empty. Any ideas?

[VBAhack]

I just had this happen. I was working on an Excel file with 11 sheets and the size was right around 1MB. I saved it and it was suddenly 10MB!

I don't recall doing anything just prior to the save that would increase the size. As an experiment, I successively deleted 1 sheet at a time and saved the file. By the time I got down to the last sheet, it was still 2.6MB!

I'm about ready to give up and reluctantly copy sheet by sheet over to a new file. This is very annoying!

[VBAhack]

I have an Excel file that is 480KB in size. All I do is open it and save, then the size is 3.5MB! I did nothing else. There aren't any event macros, nothing. All I did was open, then save. Increases 7x just by saving. What could cause this? It is insane!

[dbasnett]

I had a similar problem where I had a 80KB workbook grow to 120MB because I cleared all borders on EVERY cell. The following fixed it (I call this before closing the workbook).

Private Sub bfrCLS()
    Dim  sh As Worksheet, cSht As Worksheet
    Dim lRW As Long, lCL As Long
    Dim rng As Range
    Set cSht = ActiveSheet
    Application.ScreenUpdating = False
    For Each sh In Sheets
        sh.Select
        Set rng = ActiveSheet.UsedRange
        lRW = rng.Rows.Count + (rng.Row - 1)
        lCL = rng.Columns.Count + (rng.Column - 1)
    Next
    cSht.Select
    Application.ScreenUpdating = True
End Sub

[RobDog888]

It may be that a user copy/pasted a picture or ole object to the sheet and not deleted or had an error deleting so its left in the book.

[Torc]

Have you tried using a hex viewer to see the data that is there?

I rememeber using some from the days when DOS was king, but cannot recall
seeing any for some years now..