File Is Damaged After It Is Cleaned by Antivirus Software

When you try to open, close, or save a workbook, you may receive the following error message: When you click Details, you receive an error message similar to either of the following: When you click Close, Microsoft Excel quits.

In addition, if you can open the workbook, it contains two worksheets named ***** (five asterisks) for which the visible property is set to xlveryhidden.

This problem occurs after you scan and clean Microsoft Excel workbooks with an antivirus software program. The problem occurs when the file becomes damaged while you are cleaning the workbook.

If you cannot open the workbook, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

142117  (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/142117/EN-US/ ) Excel: Summary of Methods to Recover Data from Corrupted Files

If you can open the workbook, use either of the following methods to repair the damaged workbook.

Method 1: Copy Data to a New Workbook

Open the damaged workbook and follow these steps to recover the data:

1. Open a new workbook.
2. In the first worksheet in the damaged workbook, select the cells that contain data and click Copy.
3. In the new workbook, paste the data into a worksheet.
   
   Repeat steps 1-3 for each worksheet in the damaged workbook.
4. Save the new workbook as a new file.

Method 2: Remove the Damaged Worksheets (Excel 5.0 or 7.0 Only)

You can remove the problematic worksheets from your workbook by running the following Visual Basic for Applications procedure. The damaged sheets are hidden and named *****. Note that you cannot unhide and delete these manually without causing an invalid page fault.

IMPORTANT: Because Excel 97 cannot remove the corrupted modules, you must run this procedure in either Excel version 5.0 or 7.0.

Microsoft provides programming examples for illustration only, without warranty either expressed or implied. This includes, but is not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. This article assumes that you are familiar with the programming language that is being demonstrated and with the tools that are used to create and to debug procedures. Microsoft support engineers can help explain the functionality of a particular procedure, but they will not modify these examples to provide added functionality or construct procedures to meet your specific requirements. To use this macro, follow these steps:

1. Start Excel 5.0 or 7.0 and open the damaged workbook. Point to Macro on the Insert menu, and click Module. Type the following macro:
   
   

         Sub CleanBook()
         Dim iCtr As Integer
         iCtr = 0
         For Each Sh In ActiveWorkbook.Sheets
             If Sh.Visible = xlVeryHidden Then
                 Sh.Visible = True
                 If InStr(Sh.Name, "*") > 0 Then
                     iCtr = iCtr + 1
                     Sh.Name = "NewSheet" & iCtr
                 End If
             End If
         Next Sh
         Call BadSheet
         MsgBox "Number of damaged sheets = " & iCtr
         Application.Dialogs(xlDialogSaveAs).Show
         End Sub
   
         Sub BadSheet()
         Application.DisplayAlerts = False
         For Each Sh In ActiveWorkbook.Sheets
             If InStr(Sh.Name, "NewSheet") > 0 Then
                 Sh.Delete
             End If
         Next Sh
         End Sub
   						

2. To run the macro, click Macro on the Tools menu. Click CleanBook and click Run.
3. Save the recovered workbook as a new file.