NOD32 5.2.9.1 and Microsoft Office 97

I am running Office 97 on an XP SP3 machine with no compelling reason to upgrade Office or Windows. All worked perfectly until I tried upgrading to NOD32 5 and I had the USB HD lockup issue. I downgraded back to NOD32 4 and all was well again. Now, with NOD32 5.2.9.1 claiming to solve the USB HD problem, I went ahead and upgraded. I didn't have a chance to test the USB issue because a new issue arose that needed immediate attention.

With NOD32 5.2.9.1, anytime I opened either Word, Excel or Powerpoint and then tried to open a file using File>Open, as soon as the Open dialog box appeared, the Office 97 program would immediately crash. Opening an Office 97 program by double-clicking a document file would launch the respective program just fine. It was just the File>Open command that would crash the program.

I have downgraded back to NOD32 4 and all works fine again.

1. Has anybody seen this problem?

2. Any ideas why this happens?

 

Does disabling HIPS make a difference? As for the lockup issue, it can also occur with 5.2 provided that improperly written 3rd party software or driver is installed. One of the most common problematic drivers is Malwarebytes' protection module driver.

 

Disabling HIPS did not make a difference.

Disabling Comodo Free Firewall did not make a difference, either.

I have installed NOD32 5.2.9.1 on a second PC, a laptop, running WinXP with the same Office 97 installed, and with the same Comodo Free Firewall installed, and the Office 97 programs open fine so far. The only strange behavior on the laptop was that after installing NOD32 5.2.9.1 as a fresh install after uninstalling NOD32 5.0.94.0, Windows would not start and presented the text screen with the Safe Mode, etc. choices. I chose "Restore to the last good operating point" and Windows booted up fine and NOD32 was the correct version 5.2.9.1.

 

It is not conclusive that the Office 97 issue is working on the laptop with NOD32 5.2.9.1. Since that install required a System Restore to function, I assumed that the actual version may not be as reported and tried a reinstall of NOD32 5.2.9.1 as a repair of the current installation and upon reboot got the blue screen and had to go back to the known good configuration to get Windows to restart again. So, I am going to go back to the previous version of NOD32 5.0.94.0 on the laptop.

The issue with the laptop is a separate issue and I will start a thread about it. This thread is just for the Office 97 File Open problem.

 

Here's a compelling reason to upgrade: Office 97 has not received security updates in over 10 years and is a liability to the health of your computer.

 

Though it is true that Office 97 no longer is supported for security updates, I rarely exchange Office files with others. I will trust my team of security software to catch any problems. In the past 10 years, there have been none that were detected.

 

I am running version Eset Endpoint Antivirus 5.0.2122.1 in our school district on about 1000 systems. Even though school is out, admins are in. After upgrading from Business Edition Version 4.2.76, I am experiencing the same crashing of Office 2010 products. I am getting the crash exactly the same place, when they go to "open" a document, or go to click "save as", it crashes as soon as the open/save box appears. I have also gotten notification of Office 2010 programs also just shutting down during use. Bear in mind that we are in a controlled environment, so there have been NO windows updates or software adds that we don't know about on these systems. 1 secretary who the crashes happen quite frequently to, was just downgraded back to 4.2.76, and her problems have completely disappeared...

 

Does enabling pre-release updates on one of those computers and running a manual update make a difference? It should download the HIPS module 1052 which should likely address this issue.

 

Hi I'm seeing similar issues on Windows XP PC's with Office XP (2002).

Any ideas?

 

Since I have never been able to get email notifications of thread responses to work, I did not see the latest responses until I checked the forum today. It is nice to see that this issue is not just isolated to Office 97. Perhaps now there will be more interest in finding a solution.

I went back to NOD 4.2.71.2 on the laptop so both my laptop and desktop are at this version and Office 97 works fine. I will wait until a definitive fix has been issued before upgrading to a higher version.

Marcos - I am assuming that since version 4 does not have HIPS and version 5 does, it is the HIPS module that is causing the problem. What is it about the HIPS module that may be causing this issue? Why would module 1052 make a difference? Has something been changed or fixed regarding the Office problem?

 

I am still running NOD 4.2.71.2 because I have gotten any further responses to this thread. Has this issue been fixed? I don't want to be stuck on Version 4.

 

A while ago you wrote that disabling HIPS didn't make any difference. Could you confirm this by renaming C:\Windows\System32\drivers\ehdrv.sys in safe mode to rule out the possibility that HIPS is involved in the issue?

 

In attempting to try your suggestion, I reinstalled NOD32 5.2.9.1 from the same installation file as before and tested Office 97 File>Open commands and this time they all worked. I ran a virus scan just in case that made a difference and Office 97 File>Open commands still worked. I have not renamed ehdrv.sys or turned off HIPS. Everything is exactly as before with the only exception that normal Windows XP updates have been applied.

I have no idea why the File>Open commands are now working when they did not the first time I tried 5.2.9.1. Perhaps there was a triggering event that has not happened yet? Perhaps a Windows Update fixed something with File Explorer? Unless you have some ideas of what to check, I can only run it as it is for now and see if the problem comes back.

What about Stealth111 and dwood? Are you still seeing the problem?

Sorry if I don't reply promptly, the email notification feature of this forum has never worked for me. It works in every other vBulletin forum I subscribe to, but not this one. So I have to manually check back from time-to-time to see if this thread has any additions.