Member Avatar for masonbill

Spell check acknowledges miss spelled words but the suggestions are grayed out. I have tried a detect and repair of Office. I even went as far as reformatted the hard drive and the same thing when I install Office 2003. Any ideas on how to fix this?

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pointed at the obvious UI check and has already tried basic repairs and a full reinstall. The most likely causes that remain are: the document (or selection) is set to a language for which Word has no proofing/dictionary files, a corrupted user template or add-in is blocking the suggestion engine, or the proofing components themselves were not installed or registered correctly.

Short explanation: Word can mark a word as "unknown" without offering replacements if it lacks the language proofing files for that text. It can also fail to generate suggestions if a global template/add-in or a corrupted Normal.dot prevents the proofing DLLs from loading.

Try these focused checks (in this order):

  • Select the problem text (or press Ctrl+A) then use Tools > Language > Set Language. Make sure the correct language is picked and that “Do not check spelling or grammar” is NOT checked.
  • Confirm the Office proofing tools are installed: Control Panel -> Add or Remove Programs -> Microsoft Office -> Change -> Add or Remove Features -> Office Tools -> Proofing Tools -> set to “Run from My Computer”.
  • Test Word without templates/add-ins: close Word, then start it while holding the Ctrl key (this opens Word in a minimal mode). If suggestions return, an add-in or Normal.dot is the culprit.
  • Reset the template: close Word and rename your user Normal.dot (find it via Tools > Options > File Locations or at %USERPROFILE%\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates\Normal.dot) and restart Word so it creates a clean one.
  • Verify proofing files exist in C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office11\Proof (or Program Files (x86) on 64-bit). If missing, run the Office setup change step above.
  • If still failing, test under a new Windows user account to rule out a per-user profile problem, and check folder permissions on the Office install location.

If these steps don’t restore suggestions, note the Word build (Help -> About) and OS, then consider installing the Office Proofing Tools for your language or Office service updates.

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Member Avatar for rhoit

Spell check acknowledges miss spelled words but the suggestions are grayed out. I have tried a detect and repair of Office. I even went as far as reformatted the hard drive and the same thing when I install Office 2003. Any ideas on how to fix this?

Ok dude,
I don't think so there is some problem with your Office.
Open the Word. Some where in the Tool or something else (in the standard toolbar) search for the Options.

In option cheak the spell cheaking is on or off.

Member Avatar for masonbill

Spell Check is on under tools> options and the same things are checked as on my desktop install. In fact it is finding misspelled words but the the replacement suggestions are grayed out.

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