Knowledge Base

OFF98: Errors Occur Starting Office Apps for the First Time

Article ID: 184370

Article Last Modified on 7/16/2007

Microsoft Office 98 for Macintosh
Microsoft Excel 98 for Macintosh
Microsoft Word 98 for Macintosh
Microsoft PowerPoint 98 for Macintosh

This article was previously published under Q184370

SYMPTOMS

When you use one of the Microsoft Office 98 programs for the first time, you may receive one of the following error messages:

PowerPoint cannot launch. Please try turning on Virtual Memory from the Memory Control Panel or quitting other applications.

There is not enough memory available to continue. Use the Application menu to quit some applications, then click Try Again

The command could not be completed, because there is not enough memory available. Closing windows or quitting application programs can make more memory available.

CAUSE

This behavior may occur when the following conditions are true:

Your system has 16-24 (megabytes) MB of memory.

-and-
Virtual memory is turned off.

WORKAROUND

To correct this behavior, turn on virtual memory in Control Panel and restart the computer. To do this, follow these steps:

Point to Control Panels on the Apple menu, and then click Memory.
Under Virtual Memory, click to select On and close the Memory window.
Restart the computer.

STATUS

This behavior is by design of the programs listed at the beginning of this article.

MORE INFORMATION

An Office 98 program may not start the first time because a process called the "first run installation process" also runs. The Microsoft Office 98 program is loaded into memory and does not leave enough memory available for the first run installation process or the application to work correctly.

For additional information, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

179217 OFF98: Using First Run Installation to Troubleshoot Mac Office

178596 MacXL: Problems If Virtual Memory Off or Available Memory Low

183226 PPT98: Memory Error, Hang Saving PowerPoint 98 File as 4.0 File

Additional query words: XL98 install launch fri OFF98

Keywords: kbfaq kbprb kbsetup KB184370