I have been having a problem with several computers that I support where the settings for Word 2003 keep resetting to the defaults. Renaming the normal.dot file did not work, as Word would not create a new copy. All computers running WinXP, sp 2.
All of the computers have the Workgroup Template location set to a network resource.
One computer was fixed by deleting the user’s profile and rebuilding. I changed the Template location to be the local drive, then was able to make changes to the settings.
However, a second computer has resisted all attempts. I went so far as to uninstall Office and re-install using a different MST (which did not include the network location for the Templates). Wiped out user profile then rebooted after uninstall and before reinstall. No luck.
The time stamp on the existing normal.dot file does not ever change. I set the option to Prompt to save the normal.dot file, and it never does this. It does create the temp file (~normal.dot, or whatever the temp files are called); if I delete or rename it, Word does not create the temp file.
I tried opening the normal.dot and then saving it, and received an error about not being able to save to an open file.
Any suggestions out there?