MS Word could not be accessed – the error message (the application has encountered a problem and needs to close) came up. I used the original CD and attempted a repair followed afterwards by re-installation of the Office Suite, but halfway through got the message “Unable to access configuration for Microsoft Personal Web Server”. When I clicked OK, the repair/re-installation process continued and finished - but in a shorter time than usual. Same error message after the computer was re-installed.


I tried all of the solutions listed here, even the one that is linked above. I had this happen on two computers, and then it hit me, each time, I had just installed the free trial version of Adobe Acrobat Pro X. On a whim, I uninstalled that program, and my Word 2000 began to work normally again. I don't have enough knowledge to know why this fix worked, but it did for me.