I recently had to rollback Windows 7 because the system appeared to be corrupt. The rollback worked. I chose the option to activate on line or by phone , but then all I get after that is a message that MS Office could not be activated because the product key is invalid. What do I do now? I did have this exact same problem a few months back with another user. The scenario was almost identical. From what I read online there are two ways that you can go about fixing this issue, though the third method which I will also describe below is the one that fixed it for me.
The easiest way to fix this problem is to repair MS Office. You can do this by doing the following:. If the repair didn't work for you, then another way you can try and fix this problem is to uninstall MS Office and reinstall it. Note: if you use Microsoft Outlook, your data files emails will remain untouched as they are part of your user account. If you reinstall Outlook it should find the files again without any issues.
To uninstall and reinstall MS Office, do the following:. Unfortunately a repair and even a reinstall doesn't always fix MS Office. In this case, it's usually because Windows is corrupt here's a link explaining why and is causing you grief. The easiest way to get past this hurdle is to backup your entire computer a disk image is recommended , then format the hard drive, reinstall Windows, all your programs, and MS Office.
At this point it should work. This is the method I had to use to fix MS Office for one of my clients using remote desktop support , because we simply had no other choice in the matter. If Windows is corrupt, it will behave erratic and will prevent you from doing things - such as installing some programs.
It is a big step to take, but in the end everything worked the way it should, including MS Office. I need more computer questions. If you have a computer question - or even a computer problem that needs fixing - please email me with your question so that I can write more articles like this one. I can't promise I'll respond to all the messages I receive depending on the volume , but I'll do my best.
About the author: Dennis Faas is the owner and operator of Infopackets. With over 30 years of computing experience, Dennis' areas of expertise are a broad range and include PC hardware, Microsoft Windows, Linux, network administration, and virtualization.
For technical support inquiries, Dennis can be reached via Live chat online this site using the Zopim Chat service currently located at the bottom left of the screen ; optionally, you can contact Dennis through the website contact form. Jump to Navigation. Search form Search. Infopackets Reader Pat P. You can do this by doing the following: Click Start, then click on Control Panel.
Once you find it, double click it. The MS Office installation wizard should now appear. Choose the option to Repair MS Office. Once the wizard completes, try and run MS Office again and activate it like you normally would. If that doesn't work, proceed to Option 2. Option 2: Reinstall MS Office If the repair didn't work for you, then another way you can try and fix this problem is to uninstall MS Office and reinstall it. Left click MS Office to highlight it, then right click over top of the highlighted line and select "Uninstall".
MS Office should now uninstall. If you receive an error message that it could not uninstall, then simply reinstall MS Office as described in Step 5. This will effectively reinstall MS Office over top of itself; most of the time this will fix any corruption as a result of attempting to uninstall - and hopefully even fix MS Office itself. If you don't have a disc, you should be able to download various versions of MS Office online - search Google for the download link.
Example "download ms office microsoft. Once MS Office has finished installing, try activating it. If it still doesn't work after this point, proceed to Option 3. I hope that helps. Additional 1-on-1 Help: From Dennis contact me briefly describing your situation and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. For what it's worth, this is also a great opportunity to streamline Windows because a clean install means there won't be any junk slowing down your PC - it will be like it was brand new again.
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