4

Getting this error when trying to sort a document (Excel cannot complete this task with available resources). Document isn't particularly large, about 4,000 lines. Can't seem to figure out why this would start on this. I can sort this same file fine on everything back to Excel 2000 on older crappy computers.

Computer is running Win 7 x64, 16 Gb RAM, and another 16 Gb of virtual. There's no possible way that all of the memory is actually getting exhausted when I can perform this on an older XP machine with 512 Mb of RAM, unless 2010's memory usage is inconceivably poorly designed.

I found a few posts on forums stating that there might be a security update related bug. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Jestep
  • 345
  • 1
  • 4
  • 13
  • Have you tried to look for SP's / updates for the Excel? – Matan Eldan Sep 06 '12 at 22:25
  • Yeah, double checked it's fully updated. No errors in the Windows logs either. Possible it's a corrupt installation, or there is some other problem. This computer was setup from scratch about a week ago, so I don't think there is a hardware or OS issue. – Jestep Sep 07 '12 at 13:52
  • Well... in that case, I'll just recommend you to re-install your copy of Excel. – Matan Eldan Sep 08 '12 at 22:13
  • I generally get this error when I have a lot of array formulas or formulas referring to other workbooks in excel, do you have them? Do you run a lot of programs when receive this error message? – Máté Juhász May 05 '15 at 07:13

2 Answers2

1

For me it was my clipboard manager (Ditto). I'm not sure why, since Ditto can handle large clips, but I had a suspicion it might be that and as soon as I exited Ditto, Excel could copy it fine. (Excel does very strange things for copy and paste.)

Paul
  • 323
  • 1
  • 4
  • 10
0

Must be a common problem because there is a KB article for it. This contains 7 methods to help you resolve this issue.

Excel cannot complete this task with available resources error, Excel 2010

CharlieRB
  • 22,566
  • 5
  • 56
  • 105
  • Most of those tips seem like they shouldn't matter for someone with a file that small and a computer with that much memory. – Michael McGowan Sep 11 '12 at 19:24
  • 1
    @MichaelMcGowan Things are not always what they seem, especially when it comes to computers. If one of those methods fix the problem, then it matters. – CharlieRB Sep 11 '12 at 19:38