My computer crashed and I had to run the recovery disc to get it to work again. It did not format my computer but I've had to re-install several programs. I have re-installed my copy of office for example.



I have an external hard drive where I keep most of my files but since installing the recovery disc it won't open some of the word documents and gives an error message "user does not have access privilges." It is the same with some pdf files. What can I do?

Please help because I can't open some of my university documents.

Hi
First of all run a repair of your Office installation just in case something is not quite right. Then without going into MS Word go to your document and right-click and choose Open With and choose MS Word.
This may resolve your issue.
Good luck.
Tony (OTPM)

Thanks Tony but unfortunately that hasn't worked. I have noticed a difference though between the word and PDF files that open and those that don't; in properties advanced attributes encrypt contents to secure data is now checked. I wrote most of these files and didn't encrpyt them. To be honest my computer is a bit old and does strange things from time to time. Any ideas how to undo this?

Hi Ian
The only other thing I can suggest you try is to open a new document and then try and insert the file you are unable to open.
Failing that I have run out of ideas.
If you are happy to provide one of the file I can see what I can do and let you have it back. If you dont want to put it on here you can send it to OTPM@blueyonder.co.uk.
Tony (OTPM)

Thanks for the reply. I've tried opening them via another document but it doesn't work. I just tried to send you a copy and it says "the file could not be found. Please make sure this is a valid file and try again." This is for both the PDF and word files that have gone a bit weird.
Also I've tried to cut and paste these files and I get the message "accesss is denied. Make sure the disc is not full (it's not) or write-protected and that the file is currently not in use."
Any other ideas?

Hi Ian
have you tried picking it up from Explorer then attaching it to your post?
Other than that it sounds like you have some drive mapping issues since your system crashed.
That is something which is beyond me unfortunately.
Tony(OTPM)

Hi Everyone,
I'd just like to say thank you for all your help and that the probelm is fixed now. In the end I paid someone to sort it. He explained it was something like the permissions to some of my files were held by my old operating system and after my computer crashed and I had to put throught the recovery disc these permissions were lost. He told me he had a program that searched for the old permisssions and re-installed them.
Thanks.