Hi - I am getting the following error when opening MS Word 2003:

The drive or network connection that the shortcut "xxxxxx.lnk" refers to is
unavailable. Make sure that the disk is properly inserted or the network
resource is available, and then try again.

The error comes up multiple times with different filenames. I know that I
have fixed this before in the past but cannot find my documentation. Any help
would be appreciated.

Thanks

Dear Customer,

Based on my experience, if the Visio toolbar buttons that are added by an
old version of Visio to Word and Excel, and the newer version of Visio has
not remove them from the hard disk, such an issue may occur. Please try the
following steps to delete them manually:

1. Click Start, point to Search, and then click For Files and Folders. In
the Look in box, click drive, where drive is the drive on which Windows is
installed.
2. Search for the following files:
VisioMSO.xls
VisioMSO.dot
Insert Visio Button.xlt
Insert Visio Button.xls
Insert Visio Button.dot

NOTE: Not all of the files on this list may exist on your hard disk.

3. Right-click each file that you find, and then click Delete. Click Yes
when you are prompted to confirm the deletion.
4. Click Start, point to Search, and then click For Files and Folders. In
the Look in box, click drive, where drive is the drive on which Windows is
installed.
5. Type *.lnk in the Search for files or folders named box, and then click
Search Now.
6. In the list of files that are found, note the files (if any) that are
related to Visio. These files may point to the files that you deleted
earlier in step3. Right-click each shortcut file that is related to Visio,
and then click Delete. Click Yes when you are prompted to confirm the
deletion.

If the steps do not work, please go on to try the following steps:

Repair Office via Add / Remove
====================
1. Click Start>Control Panel
2. Double click on Add or Remove Programs.
3. Browse to Microsoft Office 2003, and click Change.
4. Choose Reinstall or Repair.
5. Click Next, and choose Detect and Repair errors in my Office
installation, please also check Restore my Start Menu Shortcuts.
6. Click Install. You may prompt for the installation CD.

Here are some articles which you can reference:

304359 "The drive or network connection that the shortcut 'Insert Visio
Button.DOT.LNK' refers to is unavailable" error message when you start Word
or Excel after you upgrade to Visio 2002
http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;EN-US;304359

If the issue still persists, please help us collect more information so
that we can perform further research:

1. Does this issue occur when you open every Word document?
2. What is the version of your Windows?
3. Does this issue only occur when you try to start Word or does it also
appear on some other applications? Please try to start Excel to see if you
receive the same error message.
4. Does this issue occur on all the user accounts? Please create a new user
account to test.
5. Please provide the exact error message with a screenshot. This will help
us a lot on our further research. My Email address: <v-lehao@microsoft.com>

To take a screenshot:
===============
1. When you see the error message, press PrScrn key on your keyboard.
2. Type mspaint in Start>Run, and OK.
3. Click Edit>Paste and save the screenshot as JPEG.
4. Send it to me as Email attachment.

If you have any questions, please feel free to post back.


Regards,

Leon Hao

Microsoft Online Partner Support
Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security
================================================== ==
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via your newsreader so
that others may learn and benefit from your issue.
================================================== ==
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

Leon,

Thanks for your response. After discussing this error with some of my peers,
we located the .lnk files being called in the users My Documents directory.
After they were relocated the problem cleared.

Thanks,
Fred

"Leon Hao [MSFT]" wrote:

> Dear Customer,
>
> Based on my experience, if the Visio toolbar buttons that are added by an
> old version of Visio to Word and Excel, and the newer version of Visio has
> not remove them from the hard disk, such an issue may occur. Please try the
> following steps to delete them manually:
>
> 1. Click Start, point to Search, and then click For Files and Folders. In
> the Look in box, click drive, where drive is the drive on which Windows is
> installed.
> 2. Search for the following files:
> VisioMSO.xls
> VisioMSO.dot
> Insert Visio Button.xlt
> Insert Visio Button.xls
> Insert Visio Button.dot
>
> NOTE: Not all of the files on this list may exist on your hard disk.
>
> 3. Right-click each file that you find, and then click Delete. Click Yes
> when you are prompted to confirm the deletion.
> 4. Click Start, point to Search, and then click For Files and Folders. In
> the Look in box, click drive, where drive is the drive on which Windows is
> installed.
> 5. Type *.lnk in the Search for files or folders named box, and then click
> Search Now.
> 6. In the list of files that are found, note the files (if any) that are
> related to Visio. These files may point to the files that you deleted
> earlier in step3. Right-click each shortcut file that is related to Visio,
> and then click Delete. Click Yes when you are prompted to confirm the
> deletion.
>
> If the steps do not work, please go on to try the following steps:
>
> Repair Office via Add / Remove
> ====================
> 1. Click Start>Control Panel
> 2. Double click on Add or Remove Programs.
> 3. Browse to Microsoft Office 2003, and click Change.
> 4. Choose Reinstall or Repair.
> 5. Click Next, and choose Detect and Repair errors in my Office
> installation, please also check Restore my Start Menu Shortcuts.
> 6. Click Install. You may prompt for the installation CD.
>
> Here are some articles which you can reference:
>
> 304359 "The drive or network connection that the shortcut 'Insert Visio
> Button.DOT.LNK' refers to is unavailable" error message when you start Word
> or Excel after you upgrade to Visio 2002
> http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;EN-US;304359
>
> If the issue still persists, please help us collect more information so
> that we can perform further research:
>
> 1. Does this issue occur when you open every Word document?
> 2. What is the version of your Windows?
> 3. Does this issue only occur when you try to start Word or does it also
> appear on some other applications? Please try to start Excel to see if you
> receive the same error message.
> 4. Does this issue occur on all the user accounts? Please create a new user
> account to test.
> 5. Please provide the exact error message with a screenshot. This will help
> us a lot on our further research. My Email address: <v-lehao@microsoft.com>
>
> To take a screenshot:
> ===============
> 1. When you see the error message, press PrScrn key on your keyboard.
> 2. Type mspaint in Start>Run, and OK.
> 3. Click Edit>Paste and save the screenshot as JPEG.
> 4. Send it to me as Email attachment.
>
> If you have any questions, please feel free to post back.
>
>
> Regards,
>
> Leon Hao
>
> Microsoft Online Partner Support
> Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security
> ================================================== ==
> When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via your newsreader so
> that others may learn and benefit from your issue.
> ================================================== ==
> This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
>
>

Hi Fred,

I am so glad to know you have resolved the issue.

If you need further assistance on this issue or encounter any new break/fix
issue, please feel free to post your questions in the newsgroups. We are
glad to be of assistance.

For future postings, I would like to list the following information as a
guideline when submitting new posts in the future. This information will
help us to understand the issue and situation more quickly. Thank you!

1. Has the server/client/product ever worked?
2. If so, what changed?
3. What service packs and updates were applied?
4. What are the steps to reproduce the problem?
5. Does it happen the same way on any other systems?
6. Please provide the exact error message with any screenshots, if possible.


Sincerely,

Leon Hao


Microsoft Online Partner Support
Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security
================================================== ==
PLEASE NOTE: The partner managed newsgroups are provided to assist with
break/fix issues and simple how to questions.

We also love to hear your product feedback! Let us know what you think by
posting

from the web interface: Partner Feedback
from your newsreader:
microsoft.private.directaccess.partnerfeedback.

We look forward to hearing from you!
================================================== ==
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via your newsreader so
that others may learn and benefit from this issue.
================================================== ==
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
================================================== ==