SOLUTION: “Click2Run Configuration Failure” when Office 2010 Starter is launched

Posted on April 30, 2011 by Steve Schardein

Here’s a frustrating issue that hasn’t yet been solved by anyone at Microsoft from what I can tell. For ~~as yet unknown reasons~~ reasons I have now discovered (as detailed later in this article), occasionally some PCs exhibit an error when launching Office 2010 Starter (which is preinstalled on many new PCs). The error is worded as such:

“Click2Run Configuration Failure”

Although many solutions on the internet (even from Microsoft employees and the KB) suggest that a simple Repair install or Uninstall of Click2Run from the Programs and Features menu will correct this, executing the uninstaller actually triggers the exact same error message.

Update (June 2012): I have now been able to confirm that this problem is caused by the use of registry cleaners. For more details on why you should never use a registry cleaner, see my blog entry here.

This error may also occur on other downloadable versions of Office 2010, but I haven’t seen it yet anywhere else. Correcting the problem with the preinstalled OEM Starter versions is tricky enough, so I decided to make that the focus of this post.

Here’s what you do to fix the problem. First, you’ll need a special Click2Run cleanup tool that has seemingly disappeared from Microsoft’s server. You can download it here:

Click2Run Cleanup Tool

Once in possession of this tool, take the following steps to correct the problem:

First, be sure to have a copy of the required installation files for Office 2010. Make a backup of them if you don’t have access to them elsewhere by copying the following directory to another location:
- %PROGRAMDATA%\Microsoft\OEMOffice14\OStarter\en-us
Execute the CleanC2R.exe file from the zip archive provided above to completely remove C2R, including the virtual Q: drive containing the relevant install files.
Reboot the PC, then execute the CleanC2R.exe tool a second time.
Reboot once more, then execute the offcln.exe tool to completely remove Office 2010 Starter.
Reboot yet again, then navigate to the ProgramData directory containing the Office Starter installation files (they must be located in the exact directory detailed above for the installation to work properly). Run the SetupConsumerC2ROLW.exe file to install C2R once again, along with a fresh copy of Office 2010 Starter.

This should finally correct the issue. If you happen to be missing the installation files for Office 2010 Starter, you can actually find them available for download in various places. Downloading the files and installing the suite is perfectly legal as long as it was already once provided with the PC new by the OEM.

If this tip has helped you, please drop me a line and let me know!

If you’re looking for computer help in the Louisville area, look no further. Call me today and get it done right!

Donate to say "Thanks" if this post has helped save you time and money! :-)

204 thoughts on “SOLUTION: “Click2Run Configuration Failure” when Office 2010 Starter is launched”

Amit on August 5, 2011 at 5:38 pm said:

Hi Steve
Thank you very much
So far you are the only one who solved for me the click-2-run problem,
and I looked for quite a long time (just before I got despaired, and was about to restore my computer).
You are indeed a rare top-level technician.
Thanks again
othersteve on August 6, 2011 at 12:33 am said:

Hey Amit,

Thanks for taking the time to leave your comment! It’s great to know my advice here has helped someone.

Have a great weekend,

Steve
Mat on August 24, 2011 at 2:37 pm said:

Winner!
Sanjeev on August 25, 2011 at 4:58 pm said:

Hi Steve,

Great tip. It helped me too, on my Windows7 laptop which had the same problem. Thanks a lot!

- Sanjeev
Laura on September 12, 2011 at 1:28 am said:

Thank you so much! definitely fixed the problem
Adam on September 14, 2011 at 2:55 pm said:

Excellent Post. Worked perfectly! Thanks.
othersteve on September 14, 2011 at 2:58 pm said:

Thanks guys. I’m thrilled it worked for you! I really appreciate the feedback.
Angela on September 20, 2011 at 2:56 am said:

Thanks for the help. It worked.
Tim on September 22, 2011 at 12:11 am said:

Hi Steve,
I second everyone else’s comments. Microsoft’s tech support left me more confused than when I began; yours worked. Great public service on your part.
Benjamin on November 9, 2011 at 4:39 pm said:

Steve – thanks for posting this. Will this work for Windows 7 Professional?
othersteve on November 9, 2011 at 4:53 pm said:

Benjamin,

It should work regardless of OS (Vista or 7, 32- or 64-bit).
Benjamin on November 9, 2011 at 4:55 pm said:

Disregard my previous post. I realize that Windows version is irrelevant to the Office version. However, after following the instructions, I received the error “There was a problem setting up Microsoft Office Starter 2010: This product must be installed to Q:. Ensure that Q: is unused and try again.”
othersteve on November 9, 2011 at 5:44 pm said:

Hey Benjamin,

The CleanC2R tool is supposed to remove the Q: drive as part of its procedure. Be sure to reboot and run it AGAIN after the computer comes back up. Also, make sure to run all the tools as Administrator if UAC is enabled.

Please let me know if this helps!

-Steve
Benjamin on November 9, 2011 at 5:46 pm said:

Thanks for your help Steve! I have a Lenovo X201 and my Q drive is where my “Lenovo_Recovery (Q:)” is located. Not sure I can erase that…
othersteve on November 9, 2011 at 6:04 pm said:

Oh! Wow, that’s a new one. You can probably create recovery CDs using the Lenovo utility and then remove the partition. That would fix the problem!
Benjamin on November 9, 2011 at 6:09 pm said:

Thanks Steve. By the way, nice site!
Lisa on November 26, 2011 at 3:11 pm said:

Dear Steve,

Thank you so much! I suffered for a year with slow applications thinking, well it’s free so they must make it load ungodly slow to encourage sales, and I had this Q:/ drive. Once the manufacturer warranty on this Windows 7 laptop was about up, “click-2-run configuration failure” even with repair. This worked, and it’s better than ever!
matt on December 7, 2011 at 4:12 pm said:

OMG. i have spent hours trying to solve this problem, sifting through page after page of Microsoft forums etc. Why couldnt i have found your page sooner. It works. Such a relief!! Nice one brother.
Mak on December 22, 2011 at 8:19 pm said:

Dude, you’re awesome!
George on December 30, 2011 at 5:36 pm said:

I think I uninstalled an office 2010 product out of order, so I was getting the “Click2Run Configuration Failure” when trying to uninstall other 2010 starter stuff, your fix worked for me. Luckily I found your site quite early in the ‘how do i fix this” department.
Thank you
Norwegian dude on January 4, 2012 at 4:07 pm said:

A whole evening of frustrated googling and scanning of corporate websites with a magnifying glass to no avail whatsoever.

Then stumbling across your fantastic blog post, and voìlá! Thank you so, so much for providing this excellent walkthrough – you solved the problem the rest of the Internet failed to fix.
Tye on January 8, 2012 at 11:47 am said:

Thanks Steve! You are definitely a life saver, I am so glad I came across your site after only a long search. After trying a couple of other suggestions I started to doubt that there was a simple solution, but you proved otherwise.
Jesse on January 8, 2012 at 3:51 pm said:

Steve – please help! I accidentally uninstalled the starter version and am needing to reinstall it… where can I get it??

Thanks
othersteve on January 8, 2012 at 11:43 pm said:

Hey Jesse,

As long as it was previously installed, you have two choices:

1) Perform a System Restore, or
2) Go here: http://forums.mydigitallife.info/threads/21441-Office-2010-Starter

Hope this helps!
Richard on January 9, 2012 at 2:39 pm said:

Thanks very much! I have an assignment due in two days and was panicking a bit! I was lucky that when I opened one of my documents it gave me the option to automatically install Office starter again so I didn’t have to download any of the files. This being on Windows 7. Thanks again.
Jesse on January 9, 2012 at 9:32 pm said:

THANK YOU! Clean up tool and step-by-step WORKED! Everything back to normal! THANK YOU!!!!!
Peter on January 17, 2012 at 7:41 am said:

Kowtow!
Malcolm UK on January 22, 2012 at 12:51 pm said:

I can’t believe this had to be so difficult. However your instructions worked perfectly.

The pain was individually downloading 33 files from Microsoft…

Thanks – I’ll certainly recommend your solution if I’m asked to fix this problem again.
Jessamine Hill on February 6, 2012 at 10:45 am said:

Just encountered this issue this morning and your instructions made it such an easy fix. Thanks so much!
kristin on February 10, 2012 at 4:35 am said:

Wow! I can’t thank you enough. You made it so easy. I’ve been trying to fix this all day and can finally get back to my report. Will definitely recommend your instructions to anyone else who encounters this problem.
tim on February 13, 2012 at 12:48 pm said:

seems to work good. not sure if this is related but after the first reboot I saw some obvious pop up about spyware called “PC cleaners”. I disabled it from running on startup and everything seems ok.
Jerzy on February 18, 2012 at 2:50 am said:

It worked – thank you. But I have a little problem. The saved file Excel Starter 2010 does not seem to excel. How do I restore the icon Excel? Associate it with what? Does it also have a way?
Regards
othersteve on February 18, 2012 at 10:13 pm said:

Hey Jerzy,

The problem is, the virtualization aspect of Starter 2010 makes file associations a serious pain if they’re corrupted for any reason. It may be better to uninstall all other versions of Excel first, then wipe out Starter using the above steps and try reinstalling it again from scratch. This will likely fix the problem.

If it doesn’t, I may need to investigate on a machine I have (next time I install it) to see what the correct registry values are for the file associations. If I’m not mistaken, at least to create a shortcut you can use the following codes:

On a 64-bit system:

Excel 2010:
“%COMMONPROGRAMFILES(X86)%\microsoft shared\Virtualization Handler\CVH.EXE” “Microsoft Excel Starter 2010 9014006604090000″

Word 2010:
“%COMMONPROGRAMFILES(X86)%\microsoft shared\Virtualization Handler\CVH.EXE” “Microsoft Word Starter 2010 9014006604090000″

On a 32-bit system:

Excel 2010:
“%COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\microsoft shared\Virtualization Handler\CVH.EXE” “Microsoft Excel Starter 2010 9014006604090000″

Word 2010:
“%COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\microsoft shared\Virtualization Handler\CVH.EXE” “Microsoft Word Starter 2010 9014006604090000″

Hope this helps.

Steve
othersteve on February 18, 2012 at 10:14 pm said:

One more word of warning: WordPress apparently likes to convert my quotes to angled quotes. When using the above shortcut codes, be sure to delete and RETYPE all quotation marks!
Leif on March 7, 2012 at 12:02 pm said:

When waiting for your answer i klickt right on the word and excel file and changed the opening with exel instead of advanced something. Than I closed and it worked well but with other icon for the word and excel documents.
Connie on March 18, 2012 at 7:01 pm said:

It worked.First had to remove old Microsoft office a.nd then only first stop above. Thanks
morula on March 20, 2012 at 11:22 am said:

dis rily helped thank you very much
rachmat on March 27, 2012 at 3:03 am said:

Thanks for your helpful post .. it helped me alot !!!
Akshay on April 3, 2012 at 8:51 am said:

This was brilliant.. so simple steps and clear as well..
You saved my day mate.

Cheers
Ivan on April 8, 2012 at 10:45 am said:

This was infinitely more helpful than almost anything I’ve ever read on Microsoft’s website. Thank you so very much! From now on this website will probably be the first place I check when I’ve got issues I can’t figure out. Thanks again!
Bmichera on April 10, 2012 at 5:24 pm said:

THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH. YOU JUST SAVED THE EDUCATION CAREER OF A FRESHMAN. KUDOS
Julie on April 19, 2012 at 1:48 pm said:

Many many thanks – I’ve been trying for hours to get rid of the stupid click-2-run thingy. I’ve restored my laptop to an earlier time about 6 times with no luck. I was a little scared to try your solution as I didn’t want to loose microsoft altogether and have to purchase another one, but after reading a few feedbacks thought I’d give it a try. I am now glad I did as I can now view my word and excell files again – you are brilliant xxx
Joe on April 22, 2012 at 10:51 am said:

Thank you for taking the time to post this and help me and others. I tried it and it finally corrected this problem. Many thanks!
Mandy on April 23, 2012 at 1:18 am said:

Thank you so much! I did it once and it worked, however for no apparent reason Starter disappeared again. I’ve done it again and so far so good. You’re a lifesaver.
mario on April 27, 2012 at 9:59 am said:

Excelente muchas gracias me funciono a la perfección!!!!
coqui3L on April 27, 2012 at 9:02 pm said:

Thank you soooooo much Steve! It worked perfectly. We got my friend out of a bind.
coolplayer on April 30, 2012 at 12:51 pm said:

hi steve,
how can i::
copying the following directory to another location:
%PROGRAMDATA%\Microsoft\OEMOffice14\OStarter\en-us
othersteve on April 30, 2012 at 1:23 pm said:

Try this:

Click Start > in the search box, type:

cmd /c md %SYSTEMDRIVE%\OfficeBackup & copy /y %PROGRAMDATA%\Microsoft\OEMOffice14\OStarter\en-us\*.* %SYSTEMDRIVE%\OfficeBackup & @echo Done! & @pause & explorer.exe %SYSTEMDRIVE%\OfficeBackup

and press ENTER. Let me know if this works!
coolplayer on April 30, 2012 at 3:00 pm said:

yah it worked, made a backup, thanks very much
my question now how can i ::Run the SetupConsumerC2ROLW.exe file
coolplayer on April 30, 2012 at 3:18 pm said:

hey steven it already worked,
thanks very much man,
this is really great
Mandy on April 30, 2012 at 10:18 pm said:

No idea why, it’s gone again! I wonder if System Mechanic could be the problem when it cleans up the registry?
othersteve on April 30, 2012 at 10:27 pm said:

Absolutely. I mention on my website the dangers of registry cleaners. They are rarely helpful and often damaging to a system, sometimes causing irreversible damage. The reason is that there isn’t any way that a program can know with certainty what is and is not needed within the registry hives. Even if a significant amount of unneeded/inaccurate data is located, the effect on performance is always negligible. I never use them in practice and always recommend against them.

My best advice is to fix the problem again, then uninstall System Mechanic and cross your fingers that you don’t run into any other strange problems it may have created down the road!
Mandy on May 1, 2012 at 8:47 am said:

Thanks so much, I’ll do that!
mohan on May 1, 2012 at 7:47 pm said:

thanks so much, it worked .
Nicholas Henley on May 4, 2012 at 8:32 am said:

Thank you for publishing this helpful tool. I have downloaded the file and have followed the easy to follow instructions.. and yes I can also say it works!!!

I cannot thank you enough for getting my Office 2010 up and working again; on which I am very grateful.
bteacher99 on May 6, 2012 at 11:57 am said:

My “second copy” (I was entitled to run Office 2010 Student/Home on two computers) suddenly went “Click2Run” on me, and claimed that the internet wasn’t connecting. Office refused to function after that, and ONLY this solution solved the problem. I couldn’t find the listed file in the Office14 folder, but I simply redownloaded the “full” file since I’d saved my product key. Thank you so much for providing these instructions.
bteacher99 on May 6, 2012 at 11:58 am said:

And for the record, this works with XP as well.
missingchord on May 7, 2012 at 7:43 pm said:

Thanks Steve. This one’s worked. Cheers.
Mielle on May 10, 2012 at 3:27 am said:

Thank you so much for posting this! I finally figured out why Microsoft Word wasn’t opening on my laptop and your guide fixed the problem completely. Thanks again.
Alan on May 10, 2012 at 9:49 am said:

Thank you so much. This is the only advice that actually worked for my office starter issue!
Carlo on May 14, 2012 at 6:45 am said:

Perfect.. Too good.. This worked for me.. Microsoft site too doesnt give a clear solution for this problem.. Thanks a lot Steve..
Christina on May 15, 2012 at 12:52 am said:

You are a true life saver!
I do all my schoolwork at home and I can’t afford to buy the full version, without this I would’ve! Thank you so so so much!
Laura on May 16, 2012 at 10:00 am said:

Thank you so much! I am a business owner, but not computer saavy. Your instructions were clear, even for me. Thanks!

Laura
Jim on May 16, 2012 at 7:26 pm said:

Hello Steve,

I have been working on my Click2Run problem for several days now and I thought I would just bite the bullet and buy the Home/Student Office. The young man at the store told me that the installation would remove anything that was a problem. Welllllllll, when I downloaded the Office product, I had the installation error about C2R preventing the installation of my new fancy Office 2010. I knew I was in trouble when my two granddaughters could not help me. I could not uninstall C2R. So I began searching for and reading anything I could find about the now infamous C2R Configuration Failure. That’s when I stumbled into your site and found your info on removing C2R and Office Starter. I followed your instructions and now have my fancy new Office 2010 running and I can finally continue my work. Mostly I use Word and some Excel.

I am not sure of your reasons for going through all the work and research to post your tips and techniques but I am most grateful that you do. Thanks so much for the help. Things were looking a little bleak for a few days. Too bad for me you aren’t closer to Sussex, Wisconsin.

Again, thank you.

Jim
othersteve on May 17, 2012 at 9:05 am said:

Thanks for all the continued comments guys! I’m thrilled this worked for you. If you have any more questions I would be happy to try and help.

Jim, well, I guess that proves that it also applies to pretty much any other flavor of Office delivered/supported by the C2R framework. It makes sense that it would, but I just hadn’t witnessed it myself yet. It’s good to know that the same solution also works in those instances.

And just for the record, the return is pretty minimal in terms of posting up these fixes on a blog for all to see. It nets me some hits to the site, certainly, but it doesn’t help me much with local business. Nevertheless I enjoy it, and truly, it’s most often meant as a future reference for myself than anything else! Once I articulate and post a fix, I’m more likely to remember how I did it later on, and plus I can always refer back to the article if I need to know how to do it all over again!

For what it’s worth, though, I can perform remote service. So if you ever need anything and you want to get in touch… I have done nationwide service before! Just let me know.
lijo varghese on May 19, 2012 at 11:38 am said:

thank you very much.
MY PROBLEM SOLVED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.
YOU ARE DOING GREAT SERVICE TO US……
THANK YOU ONCE AGAIN…………….
Paul Tucker on May 22, 2012 at 9:38 am said:

Hi Steve,

I’m having the click2run configuration error trying to bring up excel. I have not tried your
fix to the problem. My question is how much would you charge to fix it remotely?

Thanks,
Paul Tucker
othersteve on May 22, 2012 at 12:20 pm said:

Hey Paul,

I’ve done a couple others here and it generally takes around 20 – 30 minutes depending on the speed of the PC, the AV installed, etc. That’s around $25-35 if that’s cool with you!

Let me know and I can tell you how to get things set up for me.

-Steve
Todd Lewis on May 23, 2012 at 6:45 pm said:

Worked great for me! Thanks Steve!!

Bump!
Gregg on May 24, 2012 at 10:06 pm said:

Completed steps to #5 rebooted again then started office 2010, starter was there ran it to install and agreement. Thanks for your help clicktorun and your easy to follow instructions done the trick.
dwayne on May 25, 2012 at 7:11 pm said:

Ok You win the grand prize. I hate the 2010 program it locked and i couldn’t get help. Microsoft was worthless on this one. Thanks
Paul Tucker on May 27, 2012 at 12:25 pm said:

To anyone with a computer software problem you want fixed remotely:

I had a “Click to run” problem with the Office Starter, Steve had the problem resolved
remotely in less than 40 minutes.. I’m one happy computer user.
Thank you Steve..

Paul Tucker
BetterOff on June 8, 2012 at 11:38 am said:

Spent nearly 2 days trying to get rid of Starter on a new Win 7 machine so that I could install a full version of Office without errors. This worked perfect… Thanks!
Maroon59 on June 9, 2012 at 10:18 am said:

I am using Windows 7. Having a little trouble with Step 5. Have not been able to locate the ProgramData Directory. A little more explanation –please. Thanks.
othersteve on June 9, 2012 at 10:52 am said:

Maroon,

It’s a system hidden directory. The easiest way to get there is to open any Windows Explorer window and type %PROGRAMDATA% in the address bar.
Maroon59 on June 9, 2012 at 2:11 pm said:

Got it all working again. Thanks so much!
Maroon59 on June 10, 2012 at 8:44 am said:

Thought I was home free, but still having a problem.

When I click on a document–either Excel or Word–the document displays as normal. I would assume that means the Starter versions are installed.

However, if I want to create a new document of either kind, I cannot find a program to “click” on to start the program.

Help?
Maroon59 on June 10, 2012 at 9:53 am said:

A little further clarification. If I open an existing document, I can use the file function to the point where I can get to a new blank file of either kind. I just can’t find an entry in the programs listing or in the programdata file to start Word or Excel from scratch. This seemed to be working yesterday. Am I just missing something very obvious?
Iheanyi on June 11, 2012 at 4:00 am said:

Thank you sooo much for this. I had been unable to use MS Office since I bought my laptop last year until I tried this tip. Well done.
Pete on June 11, 2012 at 2:18 pm said:

Thanks very much, I too spent hours trying to sort this out & even did a reinstall of Windows 7, but nothing worked. This has worked perfectly.
pepe on June 15, 2012 at 2:21 am said:

Thanks a bunch…..this whole installation is a mess….on top of this the ‘starter’ program was on my system and I had installed the full home version and NEITHER would work due to the issue with the click to run hangups. thanks for the info and files! curiously the 3rd step didn’t show any MS office products installed but office 2010 still showed in the control panel for install/remove still
Don H on June 16, 2012 at 6:42 pm said:

Hey Steve. The local computer store (Future Shop) said MS Office 2010 Starter was un-repairable (click2run error). You proved them wrong. It took me a while but my previous experience in working in the root directory really helped. Thanks a million from Penticton, British Columbia in Canada.

dh
Sunshine on June 17, 2012 at 3:11 pm said:

Thank you very, very, much!!! I am not tech savvy at all, but your instructions were easy to follow and I did not encounter any problems. Thanks again.
Lunn Ave on June 19, 2012 at 5:59 am said:

Hi Steve, I too spent several hours trying to fix whatever it was that had gone so horribly wrong – I have no idea what happened. Working one minute, broken the next. It took me a couple of goes, but what you suggested finally did work. Thank you so much. LIFESAVER x
Don Szenina on June 26, 2012 at 11:17 pm said:

Hi Steve:

After spending a couple of hours trying to repair this problem for a friend, I happended on your solution. Thissolved the problem. Thank you for taking the time to post this detailed solution!
Tim L (UK) on June 27, 2012 at 4:00 pm said:

Hey Steve

It is now 215n hrs on day four of trying to fix the damned problem using our chums in the so called “microsoft help and support”. in a sum total of ten minutes you had me back up and running again. You Sir, are a genius. Thanks very much indeed. I have added your page to my favourites as once i have slept off my Microsoft headache I will be returning to find out if you can assist me in other issues that seem to have cropped up .

Thank you so very much sir!!

cheers

tim
Mike on July 1, 2012 at 11:48 am said:

Remarkable. More than a year on and almost certainly the most definitive solution out there.

Microsoft should honour you somehow, like naming their next OS after you…
“Windows Steven”?
othersteve on July 1, 2012 at 12:59 pm said:

LOL, I don’t think that version of Windows would sell very well, Mike.

Thanks to everyone for the continued feedback. I’m glad this has helped you!
laurent on July 2, 2012 at 8:47 am said:

hi,

i tried to follow your steps, all of them worked perfectly except the last one. when trying to reinstall office from the program_data folder i got an error in the end, i think it was step 4 or 5 of the installation process. it said that i would need to run it again but the same error appeared. i used system restore to get back to the initial state, meaning click2run configuration problem
laurent on July 4, 2012 at 7:51 am said:

in fact, when running cleanc2r.exe i can see in the console that click to run cannot be uninstalled…
othersteve on July 4, 2012 at 6:52 pm said:

If you’re using Vista or 7, be sure to run cleanc2r.exe as Administrator.
Eric on July 6, 2012 at 6:43 pm said:

Thanks. This worked perfectly. Very easy solution to a frustrating problem.
jeaniene on July 9, 2012 at 2:23 pm said:

Hi Steve
I have a question. First let me stress that I am computer illiterate. Question is I hade the Microsoft starter on my computer when I bought it(it was limited/basic). For some reason it stopped working so I had the bright idea of uninstalling it then reinstalling it. Now it won’t let me install anything unless i have a key code. When I get the key code it says I cannot download because I had a previous office on the computer. My click to run is gone. I also have a q drive which says its protected and I cannot access it. Any suggestions or am I just in a hot mess. My computer is a refurbished but only a yaer old. Do I have to get a new one because of this. Thanks ahead for the advice.
Tino on July 11, 2012 at 1:09 pm said:

Hi!

i just wanted to add my thanks. this process worked and I’ll be adding it to our DataBase of fixes but with all credit to you.

thanks agin.
othersteve on July 15, 2012 at 12:27 pm said:

Hey jeaniene,

It sounds to me like you could probably use the same steps as above to correct your issue. The only difference, of course, would be that rather than running the C2R installer for Starter Edition, you’d instead replace that with the installer for your current paid version of Office.

Tino,

Thanks for the feedback! I’m glad I was able to help.

Everyone else,

Thanks again for the continued comments. I am thrilled this worked for you.

-Steve
Mark on July 15, 2012 at 12:52 pm said:

Thank you sooo very much. I am so glad you have taken the time to help. I’m in Southern California, so if you need anything let me know.
mariel on July 16, 2012 at 9:47 am said:

im quite lost with all those techie terms, being a computer novice, i find hard to follow those instructions. can you make it simpler? thanks
Ryan11433 on July 16, 2012 at 12:18 pm said:

Thank you for saving this tool because I couldn’t find this tool for years and a reminder to correct a mistake that was caused.
Stephen on July 17, 2012 at 8:13 pm said:

Steve,

Thanks, I stumbled upon this website after looking through countless websites of useless information from microsoft. I wish I had found your site before getting System Mechanic. What a terrible product, I was starting to wonder why every single day I had so much stuff it was telling me to get rid of.

I have since saved your clean up tool and gotten rid of System Mechanic. Thanks so much!
Geejazzer on July 25, 2012 at 7:28 pm said:

Hi Steve… may i add my thanks to you for this fix.. I should know better.. had the same problem with using CCleaner which “cleaned” Office 2003 some years ago…
Will be removing System Mechanic immediately.. However are there any maintenance tools out there that can be used?
Cheers from Sydney…
othersteve on July 26, 2012 at 10:11 pm said:

Thanks everyone — I really appreciate your feedback, and I’m glad this helped you!

Hey Geejazzer,

That’s the beauty of it: you really don’t need any sort of maintenance tools beyond general checkups and preventive measures. Meaning:

1) Keeping at least 15% free space on your drive in Vista and 7 so that automatic defragmentation can occur (in XP you have to schedule it manually),
2) Ensuring everything is up to date (security and plugins especially as they’re your front line of defense),
3) Performing an occasional hardware health scan if one is available to you via built-in utilities (such as PC Doctor), and
4) Probably an annual check-up by a tech you know just to tie up any other loose ends or catch problems early on.

There’s no reason to bother with much of anything else. I find that too often my customers are fooled by previous techs into overthinking their maintenance of Windows. For the most part, everything you do to it beyond this is either marginally effective or harmful. It actually does a pretty good job of managing itself and unless you’re well aware of how to spot specific problems and solve them, there’s no good way to go about trying.

PS– I know you’re in Sydney, but if you’re ever in Louisville, of course, you should have -me- do the yearly check-up!

Hope this helps!

-Steve
Mike on August 3, 2012 at 7:56 pm said:

I see it, I believe it, It’s finally fixed! It was C2R itself that was lunched… not any of the starter apps… and no one at MS or anywhere else seemed to be able to get that through their heads. After many weeks of searching I found the answer in the last place I looked … triplescomputers.com… which from now on will be the first place I look!
Many Many Thanks
AiQuoc on August 4, 2012 at 10:00 am said:

Your Click2Run Configuration error solution may help my problem. Can you confirm that you think it will.
I uninstalled Office Starter 2010 (a major aggrevation) to get files to open with my Office 2010 instead of that blasted Starter 2010.
I get this request to activate Office 2010 but I already have and when I click Activate it says it can’t.
Can I use your above solution and stop after step 4 where it completely removes Starter 2010?
Do you think I can then double click on a word file and it open in Office 2010?
Thanks
Nadine on August 4, 2012 at 10:57 am said:

Thank you so much. These kind of issues always plague me and usually I find no solution no matter how much I look for an answer. I did what you said and now everything’s working 100%
othersteve on August 4, 2012 at 11:42 am said:

Hey AiQuoc,

I think I’d do the following:

1) Create a System Restore point first.
2) Follow through with ALL of the above steps EXCEPT #5.
3) Either:
–a) Install Office using your disc or downloaded installer, or, if you don’t have one…
–b) Reinstall your full version of Office using an MSI installer. To do this, visit this page and SKIP steps 1 – 4:

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel-help/click-to-run-switch-%20to-using-an-msi-based-office-edition-HA101850538.aspx

4) Let me know if this works for you!

To everyone else,

Thanks for the continued feedback. This solution is now one of the first search results listed thanks to your taking time to post your comments. This will help other people in the future!

-Steve
AiQuoc on August 4, 2012 at 9:22 pm said:

I’m sorry I tried to reply earlier but my computer froze.
I will try what you suggest and I’ll let you know if it worked.
Thanks for the suggestion.
AiQuoc
AiQuoc on August 4, 2012 at 9:30 pm said:

I went to your link. It looks like it wants me to purchase Office or an MSI installer? I already have purchased Office 2010 so I don’t understand the need to purchase MSI installer. Can’t I simply re-install my Office 2010 after your step 4 above?
Thanks
AiQuoc
Alan on August 5, 2012 at 2:14 pm said:

I solved my “Click 2 Run Configuration Failure” quite simply. I switched users or you can create a new user. Restart computer. Log in to that new user. Go to “Start”, “All Programs”, “Microsoft Office Starter (English)”, “Microsoft Word Starter 2010″. This will reload the program and fix the Failure problem. Do the same for the Excel. Switch users and Log in again to your own. That’s it. It worked for me.
Alfred on August 5, 2012 at 2:27 pm said:

thank you Steve for your post, it was great my problem has been resolve
Emily on August 12, 2012 at 12:26 pm said:

Thanks for this, i think this will probably fix my problem. Office Starter was preinstalled on my laptop, and i installed Office 2010 after using Office Starter for awhile. I never had any problem when opening documents downloaded in Chrome, but in Internet Explorer it would open them up in the starter version. I figured I’d uninstall the starter, but then when i try to open documents that I downloaded i get the stupid Click-2-Run configuration failure error.

I’m trying the Repair feature in Office Professional Plus 2010, but it is hanging and I don’t know if it’s actually doing anything. Should I just uninstall all office programs? Or do what you suggest above?

Thanks!
Cindy and Rik on August 17, 2012 at 11:51 am said:

Hi Steve,

Thank you very much!!

This has solved the problem easely.

Greetz,

Cindy and Rik
Bill on August 22, 2012 at 12:48 pm said:

Helped a friend fix this error message using remote software, these steps worked like a charm. Thanks!
JerkyJeff on August 22, 2012 at 1:00 pm said:

Thanks! This worked great!
michi on August 30, 2012 at 10:48 pm said:

every step worked great! only problem is I tried downloading office 2010 starter but I have no idea if I clicked the right link ince on the page because it wont work
Pete Rollo on September 3, 2012 at 6:01 am said:

You can do what Microsoft can´t! I just bought a new i7 64 bit setup. I´m English but as I live in Spain, it´s all but impossible to get a pc with windows in english. I bought my 64 bit English Office setup online direct from MS uk. Their so called workaround to remove click2run just did not work (. I followed your instructions to the letter and all worked just as you said. Many Many Thanks! )))
michael on September 4, 2012 at 1:46 pm said:

If you was female i would kiss you, absloute fantastic job
othersteve on September 4, 2012 at 1:50 pm said:

Michael:

Thanks…. ??

Everyone else,

I appreciate the continued feedback! I apologize for not getting around to answering every single question; I am doing my best. I stay pretty busy these days, so my blog is for those moments when I have a small bit of spare time!

Let me know if you are still having any issues and I can try to help.

-Steve
dracs on September 4, 2012 at 8:58 pm said:

hello steve,could you please make a video of this and post it in you tube,,i didnot fully understand to do it step by step,,, as i am not that good in computer field,,looking at the video would be a great help,,please help me i am stuck here,,another question,,is it possible to get evey word documents back after we fix this click2run error..
dracs on September 5, 2012 at 8:16 am said:

hello steve.
this is dracs again.i got the word documents back even though i had no idea where it was leading me,completely no idea about the procedure..as far as saving the file ,what i did was copied the word started and pasted it to the backup folder in c drive..did i do it right?? another question is while i was runing the cleanc2r , a mesage appeared like no path ways something msizip path missing,,blindfoldedly i ran the msizap file aswell,not knowing where it would lead me ,,,was that a right thing to do???anyways i got the files back..i can see that the Q drive is not there anymore,,will that be a problem for my pc? do i have to download the word starter again …cause i dont see the reason why i should cause it functioning …and the icon of the word starter is not there anymore ,,its like square box inside a box ,,how do i get the icons back …will it be okey if i dont have the icons back and just start working with what i have ,,if there is anything i did wrong please let me know and lastly thank you so much for being generous enough to share this knowledge with us ,,thanks.
dracs.
othersteve on September 5, 2012 at 8:20 am said:

Hey dracs,

If you follow the procedure step by step it will work perfectly. The steps guide you through backing up your existing Office 2010 Starter installation files (which it sounds like you did, and that’s good) and then completely removing all traces of Office 2010 Starter and Click2Run. Following that, reinstallation is easy using the files you backed up during Step 1.

-Steve
Danny on September 12, 2012 at 8:13 pm said:

It works again! But the the word and excel icons have been replaced with the windows default ones. Any suggestions?
Monique on September 20, 2012 at 8:10 pm said:

Finally!!! This worked!! Thanks so much
Glen on September 24, 2012 at 6:48 pm said:

Steve,
I have a new laptop with office starter 2010 installed. I activated the starter version after which I was able to open the word and excel applications o.k. A few days later I tried to open a word document and all I get is the opening arrow spinning for about 10 seconds then nothing happens. I have tried numerous ways to open the document to no avail. When I try to launch the word and excel applications the same thing happens. I do not have a Q drive installed on my computer. When I tried to go to program files to “fix” c2r I get the c2r configuration fail error. I do not get this error when I try to launch word or excel. Any ideas on what is happening or how to fix this other than doing the complete uninstall and reinstall as stated previously?
Thanks for your time!
othersteve on September 25, 2012 at 9:57 pm said:

Danny,

Hmm, that’s odd. You may be able to manually set them, but I’m not 100% sure. Do you mean they’re blank on all Word/Excel files?

Glen,

I’m pretty sure you’re stuck with a reinstall of Starter. It doesn’t really take that long; just around 20 minutes or so. Your situation sounds pretty bad, almost as though a partial install completed or something. I wouldn’t fool with it and just reinstall them as detailed instead.

Let me know what transpires!

-Steve
charlie on September 30, 2012 at 5:40 am said:

nice one!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Frank in UK on October 1, 2012 at 12:26 am said:

Hello Steve, I am trying to use your CleanC2R.exe solution with a netbook, Windows 7 starter and with Office 2010 Student / home installed over the top of Office 2010 Starter (which was pre-installed I believe). Download the cleanc2r ZIP file and it contains 4 files. Attempt to run cleanc2r.exe and get an error “Can’t find msizap.exe in the path”. The file is one of the 4 files n the ZIP package. Any clues?? Thanks, Frank
othersteve on October 1, 2012 at 8:28 am said:

Hey there Frank,

Be sure to UNZIP all files before attempting to run any of them. That error message signifies that one of the files cannot be located in the current PATH. In case you’re curious, the PATH variable is a system-wide variable (with a small user-mode extension) which references which folders to check when a program is called without a path specified. In addition to the PATH variable, the first place Windows always checks, by default, is the current folder. If, however, the other files haven’t been unzipped, they aren’t in the current folder for use. Zip files don’t count as folders in spite of the fact that they are displayed as such.

Hope this helps!

-Steve
Raj on October 5, 2012 at 5:12 pm said:

Excellent! It worked well. Bravo!
Wanda on October 6, 2012 at 11:13 pm said:

Thanks for the fix! It worked. And I was, by the way, running System Mechanic. I will either remove it from my computer or opt out of the registry cleaning feature, if possible. Thanks again!
xerexen on October 11, 2012 at 2:38 pm said:

Thanks steve..you’re great, it work…
hilda on October 17, 2012 at 3:02 pm said:

thanks a gazillion. had been trying yo use mostarter2010 for 3 days and nothing i tried would work.. then i stumbled upon your solution and it worked great. can now read/write word docs
Lauren brown on October 17, 2012 at 4:02 pm said:

Amazing! Solve my problem perfectly! You sir are a genius!
D Smith on October 20, 2012 at 10:43 am said:

I’ve spent hours trying to sort this, finding no help on the microsoft website, and the advice on forums hasn’t worked, this is the only thing that did work, although I didn’t do step 5, I just reinstalled it from online using the link on the product case (no disc drive on here), so thanks very much!
Trevor Judd on October 20, 2012 at 4:25 pm said:

Hi Steve,

Great – Thank you. This worked a teat on my Dell (that came pre-loaded with the MSO Starter) and after losing it when trying to load a full version of MS Office which I thought was a multi-user version. Top Man!

Regards Trevor (UK)
Scott Demarest on October 21, 2012 at 9:21 pm said:

Steve,

This web page was very helpful. Thanks for putting up such thorough instructions and useful tools. Very much appreciate your expertise. Much better solution than the other alternatives. -Scott
CM on October 28, 2012 at 10:51 pm said:

I had a guy remove a virus. He said that he would have to take it back to factory settings. (My laptop came with Office Starter.) I couldn’t get him to help me with this problem after I paid him. Anyway, you have saved the day. This was so easy! Thank you so much!
A Lot Better on October 29, 2012 at 3:24 am said:

Steve,
THANK YOU! YOU SAVED THE DAY! After weeks of agonizing attempted repair and googling various websites, your solution fixed the problem within 15 minutes. THANK YOU, YOUR A GENIUS!
kris28 on November 5, 2012 at 9:32 pm said:

How can I ever thank you!!! Your blog is very helpful and the directions were crystal clear, thanks so much I was frantically searching for answers for my problem with the MS office starter in my laptop. Thanks to you it working perfectly fine now thank you so much for this.
Chris on November 7, 2012 at 10:03 pm said:

YOU’RE THE BEST!!!!
Kerrie on November 11, 2012 at 12:48 am said:

Thank you SOOO much. I followed the steps and it worked like a charm!
This, after a year of not being able to access my documents and resorting to google documents instead. Thank you!
Lesi on November 19, 2012 at 8:49 pm said:

Woooot! this was the solution that I was searching high and low all over google. thank you so much – Champion!!
Catherine on November 20, 2012 at 3:49 pm said:

Thank you!!! This saved the day. Really appreciate you sharing this fix, I was very worried while browsing the Microsoft support forums!
Mano on November 24, 2012 at 4:58 pm said:

Thank you … thank you … thank you … (bookmarking TripleS homepage…done) … Thanks again
Dina on December 6, 2012 at 5:28 pm said:

Thank you SOSOSO much for this fix. I have been struggling with this annoyance for a LONG time. I truly appreciate your concise and helpful solution.
amy on December 6, 2012 at 11:09 pm said:

Thank you !!! Yeah, after hours of trying to fix this program, it finally works!! Woo Hoo! Thank you for taking the time to help all of us!!
Zain Haji on December 8, 2012 at 5:07 am said:

Thanks a million. Works perfectly every time…
Kevin Picott on December 9, 2012 at 12:55 pm said:

Great instructions! Unfortunately I seem to have a knack for having even the clearest solutions not work for me. While running CleanCR the first time it seems to hang up on “Removing Softgrid Service SftPlay…” I can’t see any such service or executable running; is it waiting for an event that’s not going to happen or is it really supposed to take hours for this to run?
othersteve on December 9, 2012 at 1:26 pm said:

Kevin,

This should only take a few minutes to complete. If you open up an elevated command prompt and type the following:

sc query SftPlay

What results?
Kevin Picott on December 9, 2012 at 4:14 pm said:

Half an hour later the prompt is still sitting there with no response. (This is my daughter’s laptop; she’s had viruses in the past which I cleaned off with MalwareBytes. It’s possible they hit something I didn’t know about.)
othersteve on December 9, 2012 at 5:06 pm said:

I would be interested to hear what happens if you run that command. If that doesn’t reveal the problem, some other things that could cause this include:

1) Corrupted permissions in the registry. This can be fixed using a Full Permissions Reset. Let me know if you need help and I can try and assist.

2) A failing hard drive. If the drive is going bad, these sort of spontaneous failures to access particular files or registry keys often begin to occur.

You could also try running the CleanC2R tool within Safe Mode, but there is no guarantee it will work there (I’ve never tried it). Before trying this I would at least try the sc query command I posted earlier.
Kevin Picott on December 9, 2012 at 7:10 pm said:

Sorry, I wasn’t being clear. It was the ‘sc’ command that still had no return after a half hour.
othersteve on December 9, 2012 at 8:02 pm said:

Kevin,

Gotcha. Okay, I’d suggest trying this:

sc config SftPlay start= disabled

Note the space after the = sign.

Post the resulting response from the system here if you don’t mind.

Then reboot the PC and try again with the CleanC2R program. Let’s see where this gets you.
Kevin Picott on December 9, 2012 at 8:38 pm said:

No response from the system at all. In fact the only response I can get from any sc queries is the help information. Not even just “sc query” ever comes back. I can’t see anything in the services window that looks like SftPlay.
othersteve on December 9, 2012 at 8:57 pm said:

Hmm, this is actually beginning to sound an awful lot like malware. I know you mentioned cleaning it off in the past… any other symptoms now? The problem is that many modern infections are very sophisticated and thus are not detected by mere scanners. Two of the most common rootkits, TDSS/Alureon (Pihar variant) and ZeroAccess can both lead to this sort of behavior. Don’t attempt to hunt for/clean them on your own or you can end up with an unbootable system.

Or it could still also be a bad hard drive possibly. I would not rule out either. Permissions are beginning to sound less likely as a cause, but until we rule out the possibility of a bad drive (or at least back everything up which is important), it isn’t a good idea to perform a system-wide permissions repair.

Check your system event log for clues:

Start > in the Start Search box, type:

eventvwr.msc

And press ENTER. You may find some help here if you filter for Errors and Critical in both the Application and System event logs.

Also look for any errors with “disk” as the source. While certainly not always present, these often can indicate problems with the system hard drive when Disk 0 is referenced.
Kevin Picott on December 10, 2012 at 6:47 am said:

No other symptoms, other than this everything seems to be running find. Nothing odd in the event logs, no reference to disk at all. You’ve given me a lot to go on, thanks so much! It seems like the most prudent course for her at the moment is to switch to OpenOffice and keep an eye out for other suspicious software activity.
Thomas H. on December 18, 2012 at 7:19 am said:

Really?! REALLY?!?! It was that easy?! I can only echo the sentiments of others when I say THANK YOU for this solution! Like others, I have spent HOURS searching Microsoft Forums and other online avenues to solve this problem (2nd computer I have encountered this with).

I wanted (did, actually) to yell expletives in frustration when tackling this problem. Now I want (did too, actually) yell expletives in elation at how simple and effective this solution was!!!

I will also agree that the instructions could use a little ‘dumbing down’ for us non-computer speak types. Perhaps a list of instructions with screen shots of where to look for stuff. Things like ‘execute’ when that’s not a word Windows uses (Run, instead?), and exactly how to search the ProgramData directory in Step 5. I eventually stumbled through it, but it was a sheer guess on my part at times as to what some of the instructions meant.

For all of you reading this and preparing to perform the steps, I advise you write down the 5 steps EXACTLY as worded (I took a pic of the screen and just referred to it). As you go through system reboots, you will lose your page and time looking for it each time.

Once again, THANK YOU for taking the time to do this for us!

Thomas H.
Civilian Contractor, Afghanistan
mks on December 20, 2012 at 3:42 am said:

i have completely uninstalled office 2010 that was pre-installed on my laptop i bought from lenovo . i have product key how can i get it back? i tried

http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/products/microsoft-office-2010-backup-FX101828860.aspx?CTT=5&origin=HA101828490
your Office 2010 Product Key provided represents a product which is not eligible for free download. Please re-enter your Product Key and try again, or check the list of eligible products. If this does not work, you may be interested in downloading a free trial or purchasing Office 2010 products at http://www.office.com please help me regarding this
RastaFarzi on December 21, 2012 at 3:29 pm said:

Steve, you should probably set up a donation link for those members of the public whom have resolved the issue on hand due to your informative post, especially considering the vast amount of positive comments and more importantly, happy members of the public thanks to your post. I’m sure there are many people (such as myself) whom would like to express gratuity in terms of donation per such a fantastic, unique (ie: haven’t found a solution to this on any other site per google search, seems like yours is the unique one of few, if any at all) post.
Thomas H. on December 23, 2012 at 5:49 am said:

UPDATE: Steve, here is something for you to look into! I think I have found what has caused this issue for me. After running the initial CleanC2R, I used my computer as normal and a couple days later the problem reemerged. In that time I had; restarted my computer multiple times, run a deep scan (including Q drive), used multiple Office files, and clicked OK when the window for Office Updates appeared.

I ran CleanC2R again and did each of the above one at a time to see if I could isolate the problem. After multiple reboots, two Deep Scans, and accessing multiple Office documents I encountered no issues. However, upon clicking OK to the Office updates, the problem occurred yet again shortly thereafter.

Therefore, After a third CleanC2R, I now click Cancel when the update window appears, and I have been trouble free since.

On my previous computer with this problem I did have CCleaner installed. On this computer I did have Defraggler. I uninstalled it after the first issue after reading your advice on cleaners. There is still a link to this problem with the Office updates however.

I agree with Rasta, I think you should have a DONATE link. I would gladly contribute for saving my butt with this problem. Computers are hard to get over here (cannot be shipped because of Lithium Ion batteries) and I need Office for my job.

Thomas Hess
Civilian Contractor, Afghanistan
othersteve on December 23, 2012 at 10:39 am said:

Guys,

Thanks again for all the kind comments and feedback. I’ve taken your (Rasta & Thomas) advice and provided a small “Donate” button on the right-hand side of my blog posts now in case anyone wants to say thanks.

Thomas,

That’s bizarre that it’s only seemingly occurring following an update. Updates to the Office system are pretty important as they include security patches. Plus, I install these same updates on hundreds of PCs that I configure for clients of mine without any issue at all. There must be something else occurring in conjunction that is triggered by the updates once installed. I wonder if there’s some way to isolate the source of the issue.

I would be curious to see if the same problem persists after a full permissions reset is performed on the registry. If you feel like performing any additional experimental work on your PC here (and if you’d like to try and install the updates successfully), you can also try this to see if it makes a difference:

1) Download/install this tool to the default location: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=e8ba3e56-d8fe-4a91-93cf-ed6985e3927b&displaylang=en
2) Click Start > in the Start Search box, type notepad “%USERPROFILE%\Desktop\reset.bat” and press ENTER. Say Yes when prompted whether or not to create a new file.
3) Copy/paste the following into the notepad file:

if exist “%ProgramFiles%\Windows Resource Kits\Tools” cd /d “%ProgramFiles%\Windows Resource Kits\Tools”
if exist “%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Windows Resource Kits\Tools” cd /d “%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Windows Resource Kits\Tools”
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE /grant=administrators=f /grant=system=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CURRENT_USER /grant=administrators=f /grant=system=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT /grant=administrators=f /grant=system=f
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive%\ /grant=administrators=f /grant=system=f

4) Save/close the notepad file, then head to your Desktop. Right-click the reset.bat file and choose Run as Administrator.

This will reset all permissions on files and registry keys on the drive so that the Administrator and System accounts have full access to them. I wonder if a failure during install due to permissions might be causing the weirdness that we’re seeing post-updates on this machine. Let me know if you do decide to try this (there’s no harm in it!), and if not, it’s no big deal!

Thanks and talk to you guys soon,

Steve
othersteve on December 23, 2012 at 10:44 am said:

Er, looks like the Donate button is only appearing on the main page right now. I’ll get that fixed soon.

Edit: Fixed now.

Thanks again!
Josh Gilbert on December 28, 2012 at 12:40 am said:

Fantastic post, very thorough and got to the root of the problem. Much better than the numerous posts that attempted to use the un-install/re-install feature of the Control Panel.

I appreciate the help, and highly recommend this post for anyone experiencing this issue.

-Josh Gilbert
SteveM on December 28, 2012 at 1:28 am said:

Well I am running Windows 7 and I tried to use this solution to reset the file associations for .xls to automatically open with MS Office Starter but it didn’t work. I thought that doing this would reset all of the file associations but apparently not.

SteveM
othersteve on December 28, 2012 at 3:09 pm said:

Hey Steve,

First off, nice name

Secondly, please try this:

Open a Command Prompt window (Start > in the Start Search box, type cmd), then type assoc .doc at the prompt and press ENTER. What is the result?
AlexGq on December 28, 2012 at 5:28 pm said:

Hi Steve,
Thanks for the very useful information!
I have a further question, though.
Could I just stop at the reboot after step 4 if I just want to get rid of the whole Office thing? I have LibreOffice and it works like a charm. I just wanted to delete the Q directory and wipe that “30015″ error from view!
Thanks again.
Stephenie on January 1, 2013 at 2:43 pm said:

Hey I am really hoping this will help me. However, the link provided earlier about reinstalling Microsoft Starter is not valid. It appears they took it down in November 2012. Is there somewhere else I can go to do this? Also how do I backup my files that were saved in this program? Thanks so much..love this site!
othersteve on January 1, 2013 at 3:07 pm said:

Alex,

Certainly; there should be absolutely no harm in doing so. However, if the uninstaller works from within Programs and Features in the Control Panel, that’s always a better first option.

Stephenie,

Looks like the links were taken down due to a DMCA request. If you already have the Office Starter suite installed, however, or if it originally came with your PC and you didn’t uninstall “Microsoft Office 2010″ from your Control Panel, you shouldn’t need to redownload the files anyway. You can instead find them here:

%PROGRAMDATA%\Microsoft\OEMOffice14\OStarter\en-us

Try opening your Start Menu and typing in the Start Search box:

explorer %PROGRAMDATA%\Microsoft\OEMOffice14\OStarter\en-us

Then press ENTER and see if the directory opens. If it does, all you need to do is follow the steps in the original post to repair the installation.
Thomas H. on January 2, 2013 at 4:51 am said:

Steve,

Sorry for the delay! I downloaded the microsoft tool and typed the command in the Start search window in step 2. I received the following X message: Windows cannot find ‘C:\Users\Administration\Desktop\reset.bat’. Make sure you typed the name correctly, and then try again.

I performed this attempted in both my user and administrator accounts and ensured that the %command was typed properly.

Thomas Hess
Civilian Contractor, Afghanistan
othersteve on January 2, 2013 at 9:43 am said:

Hey Thomas,

I apologize; it may be due to my blog software converting the quotation marks to angled quotes. Try this instead:

Once you’ve got SubInACL installed, download this script, right-click, choose “Run As Administrator”:

http://www.triplescomputers.com/files/reset.bat
Thomas Hess on January 6, 2013 at 2:26 pm said:

Steve,

I was able to get that code into notepad and run the .bat as an administrator. Upon receiving the C2R Update notification, I clicked ‘OK’ this time.

Afterwards, upon attempting to open a Word document, I ran into the same issue. When opening the document, the window says ‘Processing…’ and my download notification on the task bar says that Office is ‘downloading items and that the program may appear to be unresponsive.’

After several minutes, the dreaded C2R App Manager box appears stating that Office 2012 needs to be repaired! This confirms that something about the update is causing this problem for me.

Note that I have tried to run the C2R update on my Admin user account as well, with the same results.

-Thomas Hess
Lori Blocker on January 9, 2013 at 1:30 am said:

Steve,
OMG Thank you so so so much, I had searched for weeks on how to fix this Click 2 Run problem, to no avail. I am not that savvy at the computer and was terrified to try this, it just seemed complicated for me. I was having other issues with my computer and was afraid if I tried it, I wasn’t sure what might happen. I had to try it , I did and it worked so…..Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I have liked you on facebook, put you on my favorites list and have told everyone I know about you. This is the first place (and I am sure will be the last) I will look when I am having any other issues.
Have an awesome day, cause I know I will now!
George MacDougall on January 12, 2013 at 8:26 am said:

Thanks form Lakefield, ON Canada. You make the Internet a better place.
Raj on January 14, 2013 at 9:05 am said:

Thank you so much, I followed your steps for the very first time and everything was fixed, I am from a non-computer background, who only knows on how to work and operate it.

Great effort, thanks again
Mike on January 17, 2013 at 11:29 am said:

I must be dumb! I have tried and failed to find that %PROGRAMDATA%\Microsoft\OEMOffice14\OStarter\en-us
file with no luck. What the heck am I doing wrong?
othersteve on January 17, 2013 at 12:41 pm said:

Hey Mike,

Well, first of all, %PROGRAMDATA% is an environment variable that actually points to the %SYSTEMDRIVE%\ProgramData folder (which is hidden), where %SYSTEMDRIVE% is your main hard drive letter (i.e., C:).

If you can’t find it, try this:

Open your Start Menu and in the Start Search box, type:

cmd /c md %SYSTEMDRIVE%\OfficeBackup & copy /y %PROGRAMDATA%\Microsoft\OEMOffice14\OStarter\en-us\*.* %SYSTEMDRIVE%\OfficeBackup & @echo Done! & @pause & explorer.exe %SYSTEMDRIVE%\OfficeBackup

Then press ENTER. Let me know what happens.

-Steve
holly on January 29, 2013 at 11:52 pm said:

i cant find anywhere to re install my office starter steve???
Steve Schardein on January 29, 2013 at 11:54 pm said:

Holly,

Did you successfully back up the files in Step 1?
Karen Wright on January 31, 2013 at 3:16 pm said:

Hi…Looking for help to an annoying problem and you seem a knowledgeable and friendly guy…perhaps if you can’t help, you could point me in the right direction?

Ok…firstly, I have little computer knowledge so instructions need to really be step by step…

I cannot find Microsoft word 2010 anymore! I can open documents using it…ask for a new document page and then save it but have to go through the nonsense of having to open a previously saved document first!

It is not listed in my programs

Any ideas on how to get it back on the start up page…it has been gone for ages and we just do this silly way of using it but it would be great to get it back to normal.
Many thanks for reading and hope I haven’t wasted your time.
Steve Schardein on January 31, 2013 at 4:11 pm said:

Hey Karen,

Was it an installation from a DVD or CD, or a preinstalled version?
Johana Guinayen on February 10, 2013 at 9:01 am said:

Hi,
I’m sorry i’m having problem with the last step..i can’t find the SetupConsumerC2ROLW.exe..i can’t locate this..please help need to get my microsoft office working pls pls pls
Steve Schardein on February 10, 2013 at 4:19 pm said:

Hey Johana,

If you can’t find the installer file, it’s possible you may have accidentally deleted it. If so, if you are running Windows 7, you can try right-clicking the folder which is supposed to contain it (detailed above) and choosing Restore Previous Versions… to see if any backups exist!

Alternatively, you can also try a System Restore to the point prior to where you deleted the files.

Hope this helps!

-Steve
grateful gertie, uk on February 15, 2013 at 4:29 pm said:

Steve, thank you so much. I am female and would happily kiss you too I have excel starter back. I can not believe i have done this given my deviations from your script. I need someone to help me configure some other stuff here in the uk and I would be interested in talking to you about it. It is basic stuff but not my forte. Would you be able to help? It’s stuff like configuring my samsung galaxy note 2 “phablet” as a wifi router for my asus netbook and setting up an hp all in one eprinter 1070a to print wirelessly from the samsung galaxy note 2 and netbook, mainly from the note though. I live in carrot crunching countryside where there is no free wifi. My samsung can be configured as a wifi router and my data plan allows it. I am also getting the smart docking station to use with the note. No doubt I will need assistance to hook this up to my tv and other media. Please let me know what you would charge for this if you were interested. I still can not believe excel works. Thank you so much. Grateful gertie
grateful gertie on February 15, 2013 at 5:20 pm said:

Steve I have tried to like you on Facebook but can not find Triple s. Can you put a link in a reply here and then I will. Having read more about your work, I suspect you will not be interested in my earlier request. Thanks again for the help. best wishes grateful gertie
Karthick.R on February 16, 2013 at 3:27 pm said:

Tremendous job…. thank u very much!!I fixed the issue by following your instruc….
Steve Schardein on February 16, 2013 at 3:32 pm said:

@Karthick.R:
Glad to be of assistance.

@Gertie:
Well, it’d certainly be difficult to help with that sort of thing remotely, though I do a lot of that here in Louisville! Happy I could help with your Office woes however.

Since you asked, you can like me on FB using this link: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Triple-S-Computers/144735048931153

But I really don’t get on FB all that often. Of greater impact are my Google reviews:
http://maps.google.com/maps/place?q=triple-s+computers&hl=en&cid=6351664513338394638

Please don’t feel obligated however! I am just happy to help.

Have a great weekend.
Marie on February 25, 2013 at 2:22 pm said:

Thank you so much for this fix. Everything was fine until 2 days ago…..would not open up or let me uninstall or repair thru control panel. Did this fix in less than 15 minutes. Worked on this mess with microsoft for 2 days with no help….just a bigger mess. Again….THANKS!!
Kate A. on February 28, 2013 at 6:05 pm said:

Hi ya,
I cannot find the OEMOffice14\OStarter\en-us directory under the progdata file. What do I do as I’m trying to re-install Microsoft office Starter? Kindly assist.

Regards,
Kate
Steve Schardein on February 28, 2013 at 11:22 pm said:

@Kate A.:

If it isn’t there, you may have inadvertently removed the installation files. If so, if you are running Windows 7, you can try right-clicking the folder which is supposed to contain it and choosing Restore Previous Versions… to see if any backups exist!

Alternatively, you can also try a System Restore to the point prior to where you deleted the files.

Hope this helps!

-Steve
Terry Craven on March 17, 2013 at 3:53 pm said:

Dear Steve,
Thank you so much for this information! It worked perfectly! Many thanks for a simple solution to a very annoying problem! You da man!
Hazel is no maid on March 17, 2013 at 5:02 pm said:

I AM SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HAPPY ON THIS WONDERFUL DAY. Ok I’m gonna stop yelling in excitement but I am so thankful for you posting this. It worked! I can finally go on with my life. This really worked. I have tried so many things and nothing. Although it’s not that easy for a novice like myself but it I tried it and it worked perfectly. Ok bye ^_^
Kellee on March 17, 2013 at 6:52 pm said:

Hot dang Steve! Years later and this post is still a rockin’ solution! Thanks so much for your help and I’m sooooo happy you made this an easy fix! Have great days
-
ashley on March 19, 2013 at 10:09 pm said:

Can you please explain your instructions in lamens terms? I am lost and really need my microsoft working.
MATEO on March 24, 2013 at 1:18 pm said:

HELP ME LEFT IN STEP FIVE DO NOT LIKE WHAT SIE please help me
Cks on March 27, 2013 at 7:53 pm said:

Thank you so much for the fix! I searched and tried everything. Wish I would have seen this first! Maybe the techs at Microsoft could use your expertise since nobody there could help!
Ket on April 5, 2013 at 8:05 pm said:

Devine!
Sheeraz on April 11, 2013 at 2:55 pm said:

Hello,

Please help i dont understand the last question and now i have even lost Microsoft Word
Sumedha Mahajan on April 25, 2013 at 10:36 am said:

Thank u so much.

My father was having so much trouble with this error.!
Fixed it for him using the above steps.

Worked like magic
todd thompson on April 28, 2013 at 11:21 pm said:

you are the man!! on point instructions. much thanks
Kristie on May 7, 2013 at 3:05 pm said:

Hello I have followed the step but when I run the SetupConsumerC2ROLW.exe file, the set up gets to stage 3 and says there was a problem with Microsoft Office setup. is there anyway to solve this problem?
Steve Schardein on May 10, 2013 at 5:36 pm said:

Hey Kristie,

Try right-clicking the .exe and choosing Run as Administrator.

-Steve
Shaina on May 18, 2013 at 11:40 pm said:

“If you happen to be missing the installation files for Office 2010 Starter, you can actually find them available for download in various places.”
where can i find this download?
Steve Schardein on May 19, 2013 at 8:28 am said:

Thanks all for the continued kind comments. It is my pleasure to have helped!

@Shaina:

Unfortunately, I cannot legally provide a link to them. Sorry!
Claudia on May 20, 2013 at 7:06 pm said:

omg, you’re my hero! I’ve just used this and it helped so much! I was so nervous, because I have to write my final thesis for University and I needed Word and it just stop working. Then I’ve tried all those complicated solutions I’ve found on Google and none of them worked. Buy yours is awesome!
Thank you so much! Keep up the good work!

(sorry for possible spelling or grammar mistakes. English is not my native language).
Claudia on May 20, 2013 at 7:08 pm said:

But*

Triple-S Computers Blog – Louisville, KY computer repair specialist

Tips from the trenches of advanced computer repair

SOLUTION: “Click2Run Configuration Failure” when Office 2010 Starter is launched

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