Closing Sheet and/or Exiting from Excel Takes Excessively Long

 Last reviewed: November 3, 1994
Article ID: Q75334
The information in this article applies to:
  • Microsoft Excel for Windows, versions 3.0, 4.0, 5.0
  • Microsoft Excel for OS/2, version 3.0

SUMMARY

Sometimes it takes a considerable amount of time to close one or more sheets, or exit completely from Microsoft Excel. Usually this is caused by an inefficient design of one or more sheets, or certain interactions between sheets (that is, macro sheets, worksheets, and even charts). Following some basic rules may greatly improve this somewhat rare, sluggish behavior.

MORE INFORMATION

Listed below are some of the reasons why it may take very long to either close a sheet or exit from Microsoft Excel:

  1. Calculation is slow.

    Possible Solutions ------------------

    a. From the Options menu, choose Calculation.

    b. Select Manual and uncheck Recalculate Before Save.

    c. If your spreadsheet contains data tables, select Automatic 

          Except Tables as your calculation mode.

    d. Optimize worksheet organization or redesign your model. (See 

          the pages referenced below.)

  2. A Large number of links are used.

    If a source (supporting) sheet is closed, all the formulas that contain links in the dependent sheet need to be updated. The more links there are, the longer this takes.

    Example -------

    Sometimes it seems practical to use a large number of VLOOKUP functions to create the effect of dynamic data extraction. Often this constitutes very large arrays, conserving memory, but not reducing calculation time. When closing the independent (source) document first, all VLOOKUP functions need to be modified to include the path of the source data. After the independent sheet is closed, the dependent sheet may then first recalculate before it closes too. This process can take up to 10 minutes, or even half an hour.

    Possible Solutions ------------------

    a. Close the dependent sheet first.

    b. From the Options menu, choose Calculation and cancel the 

          selection of Save External Link Values.

    c. Reduce the number of external links.

REFERENCES

"Microsoft Excel User's Guide 2," version 4.0, pages 59-67 and 195-202

"Microsoft Excel User's Guide," version 3.0, pages 696-700

KBCategory: kbusage
KBSubcategory:

Additional reference words: 3.0 3.00 4.0 4.00 5.0 5.00

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Last reviewed: November 3, 1994
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