MS Word crashed and document contents lost

Question

Level 1

37 points

MS Word crashed and document contents lost

Hello, have experienced a problem whereby MS Word presented with strange visual artefacts and laptop become unresponsive. Word had been open for an extended time while working on an extensive essay. After resorting to reset to the MBP, the word doc appeared to still be there and didn't report any corruption or error. But, when opening the doc, found it to be completely void of content.

File had been saved to iCloud Drive and auto-recovery set to save every 10-minutes.

Of the 3 files open at the time, only a single file could be recovered from built in document auto-recovery (checked in the hidden containers). The other two documents contents was deleted. There was no instance of either of these documents in the auto recovery. There also doesn't appear to have been any crashed reported in the system logs.

Have experienced similar issue once previously where none of the feature auto-save or auto-recovery options

Trying to determine what may have caused these symptoms; corruption of the document(s) itself, failure of Word or issue with MacOS itself?

Thanks.

Posted on Oct 25, 2023 7:27 AM

Reply

Answer 1

MartinR

Level 7

21,661 points

Oct 27, 2023 11:20 AM in response to vernhs

FWIW, the artifacts, shadows & distortions in your screenshots appear to indicate a graphics or display hardware problem of some sort, not a problem with Word per se.

I suggest at least running Apple Diagnostics to see if it discovers any problems.

If your MBP is still under warranty or AppleCare, contact Apple Support. You could also make an appointment with Apple Genius Bar to have them look at your MBP.

Reply

Answer 2

Old Toad

Level 10

210,579 points

Oct 25, 2023 11:06 AM in response to vernhs

Have you installed and run any "cleaning", "optimizing", "speed-up", anti-virus or VPN apps on your Mac?

Download and run Etrecheck. Be sure to give it Full Disk access before running.

Copy and paste the results into your reply. Etrecheck is a diagnostic tool that was developed by one of the most respected users here in the ASC and recommended by Apple Support to provide a snapshot of the system and help identify the more obvious culprits that can adversely affect a Mac's performance.

Copy the report

and use the Additional Text button to paste the report in your reply.

Then we can evaluate the report to see if we can determine the cause of the problem.

Reply

Answer 3

vernhs Author

Level 1

37 points

Oct 27, 2023 4:31 AM in response to Ronasara

Thanks for the input. In the interest of saving time, I had posted in both communities; as it's not necessarily an issue limited to MS Word. We've not been able to determine that. The MBP had become unresponsive, so could very well have been an issue with MacOS.

Reply

Answer 4

Ronasara

Level 6

15,043 points

Oct 25, 2023 10:03 AM in response to vernhs

For complex issues with any Microsoft product I recommend you visit the Microsoft help site. It is their product and they are the best equipped to assist you. Good luck.

Reply

MS Word crashed and document contents lost

Similar questions