Summary: Microsoft Office documents, ZIP folders, and other data files may get corrupt due to various reasons like large size, virus infection, and bad sectors on hard drive. This would mean complete loss of information, unless the corruption is resolved. Here, in this blog post, we overview manual techniques that can be used to repair Microsoft Office documents and ZIP files. We also outline a specialty file repair toolkit that provides DIY utility for repairing corrupt Office documents (Word, PowerPoint, and Excel) and ZIP files. The file repair toolkit restores the document information & formatting to its original state.
Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook are among the most widely used productivity software in the world. Zip file is another popular format used for archiving and distributing files via local transfer or over the Internet. While these file formats offer great convenience, they can get corrupt in certain scenarios (see below), leading to loss of valuable information.
Reasons behind File Corruption
Some of the common reasons for corruption of Microsoft Office files include:
- Virus Infections
- The sudden shutdown of the system while you’re working on the file
- Bad sectors on the hard drive
- Over-stuffing of data in a single file
Now let’s take a look at some of the reasons behind ZIP file corruption:
- Improper compression of data within the ZIP files
- Incomplete download of ZIP files from the Internet
- Changes in browser settings
- Abrupt system shutdown when the files are being compressed
- Virus infections or bad sectors on the hard drive
Many of these reasons emerge from actions that may not be in your control, which means file corruption can affect anybody.
Let’s take a quick look at some of the manual techniques for repairing corrupted MS Office and ZIP files.
Repair corrupted Microsoft Office files with the help of Built-in Open and Repair Utility.
Here’s how to use this utility:
- First, launch the respective Office program through the Start menu
- Next, click on File -> Open or click on the Office button and then select Open. Don’t try to open the file through the ‘Recent’ section as it won’t launch the Open dialog box which is needed for this technique
- Browse to the location where the file is stored
- Select the file that you wish to repair by single-clicking on it and then click on the arrow next to the ‘Open’ button. This will open a drop-down which will contain the ‘Open and Repair’ option. Click on it
- Follow the subsequent instructions to repair the file
Repair corrupt ZIP files by using Windows command prompt
This method involves running a command on the Windows command prompt. Here are the steps:
- Click Start menu and type Run to open the run box or press Windows + R buttons together.
For Windows XP
- Once the Run dialog box opens, enter ‘regsvr32 %windir%\system32\zipfldr.dll‘ and press OK button
- The above step will enable built-in ZIP support from your computer
- Then restart your system and verify if the file is repaired.
For Windows 7/8/10
- Enter regedit in Run dialog box
- Expand HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT folder
- Click CLSID folder
- To disable the support for ZIP files, you need to delete this key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{E88DCCE0-B7B3-11d1-A9F0-00AA0060FA31}
If these methods fail to revive the corrupt documents, it means the corruption is too severe for inbuilt utilities to handle. In such a case, you will need an advanced file repair tool. The next section reveals the best all-in-one tool for file repair.
Repair corrupted Office & ZIP files with Stellar Toolkit for File Repair
Stellar Toolkit for File Repair is an advanced utility that can fix severely corrupt Office files as well as ZIP files. This all-in-one repair utility acts as a one-stop solution to repair MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and ZIP files. It comes with an intuitive graphical user interface which makes working with it super easy, and the toolkit works with MS Office versions 2016 through 2000.
Some of the notable features of the toolkit include:
- Repairs severely corrupt Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint documents
- Repairs corrupt ZIP files
- Preserves original text and formatting of documents, presentations, and workbooks
- Simultaneous repair of multiple files, with file preview before saving
- User-friendly GUI
- Compatible with Office 2016 and older versions till Office 2000
Stellar Toolkit for File Repair is easy to use and fixes all types of corruption in MS Office and ZIP files. For the complete working process of toolkit, click here.
Conclusion
Handling file corruption isn’t always easy. When corruption is severe, even the best manual methods can fail. In such scenarios, advanced utilities such as Stellar Toolkit for File Repair provide effective solution to fix all types of corruption and make the files usable again.
