Word 2004 Templates yield HUGE filesizes when used by Windows machines?

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Hi, I have OS 10.3 and Office 2004. I have created a very simple letterhead template in Word. The file size of it when I'm sending it as a one-page memo is about 150K. The letterhead is an embedded .jpg (though I've also tried .png and .tif). I made the graphics in Fireworks, but have tried opening and resaving them in Preview to try to rule out a bug in the paint program. I can send the letterhead to myself and everything works as you would expect.

However, when I send it to a Windows machine, the file will either crash their version of Word when they try to open it, or it balloons up to multiple megabytes in size when they send it back to me (or anyone else). I've tried everything I can think of (including remaking the letterhead graphic multiple times and using the 3 graphics formats mentioned above). The problem is consistent.

Any suggestions/solutions would be greatly appreciated.

I'm thinking of trying to remake the Word template on the Windows machine and then let them use it on Windows and i can copy it to Mac, but I'd really rather be able to build templates on Mac and have them be compatible with Windows.

Edit: Just in case it helps, the Windows side of this is Windows XP Pro- all latest updates on relatively new hardware in Dell notebooks & desktops. And what I mean by huge filesizes occurs when it is opened, some text is edited, and then saved as a Word file to be sent to someone else.

 

[scan300]

The resolution of your image is too high. Uncompressed it is 1.7Mb.
You have set your resolution at 360dpi, or approx 2400 pixels across.
This is too big for a distributed template document, especially as the header will repeat with each page and increase the filesize.

You need to make a choice about whether the header needs to be printed on an office printer or just viewed on-screen. If it needs to be versatile and print on laserprinter etc, 150dpi (approx 1000 pixels across) would be an ideal compromise. If the letterhead is predominantly for email, the 75 dpi ( approx 500 pixels across) will be fine.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

scan300, thanks for the answer. I tried your idea and shrunk the resolution from 300dpi to 150dpi. We will be printing some, so I need to maintain a good dpi level. I saved the file as a Word Template in Mac Word 2004. Then I opened it as a document and immediately saved it as a Word .doc file. I attached it to an Entourage email message and it attached as a file size 93K.

I sent it to the person with Windows XP and it opened without crashing his machine. He dragged it onto his desktop, opened it, put in a short "testing" message and saved it as a Word .doc file again. He sent it back to me through Outlook Express and it arrived as 661K. His "testing" content was just a few chars. I saved his reply (Word doc) to my (Mac) desktop and then did a "get info" to check filesize. It was back down to 56K. I opened a new message and attached it and it attached at 56K.

What is going on? Why is the Windows machine blowing the filesize up approx. 10 times?

Attached find the 150dpi version of the Word template. Any additional ideas/suggestions (from anyone) would be appreciated.

 

[scan300]

It may be that the Windows version of Word and the Mac version of Word, deal with graphics differently ie, it doesn't compress the embedded graphic.

I would take this to the Microsoft Mactopia site and search their FAQ or request an explanation from them.
http://www.microsoft.com/mac

I also notice that the file size increase happens during email. What happens to the size of the doc when it is saved to the Windows hard disk? This may be an issue with email attachment encoding. Binary files are converted to ASCII so they can be transmitted, and this will add to the file size.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

When its on a Windows machine it is always big. Desktop or as email attachment- about 10 times larger than what I send from the Mac. I've searched the Mactopia forums, but i don't see much there. I've tried posting a similar call for help on the Google newsgroup. However, if anyone has any additional ideas, I'd appreciate it.

And thanks again Scan300 for trying.

 

[robocub]

I'm experiencing the same exact problem. I've tried researching the problem but haven't come up with any actual solutions.

According to the MS support site, unchecking Fast Saves should fix the problem, but it didn't. I also tried to compress all the images in my Word document on the PC side. That didn't help either.

I started with a 986K files and once I resaved on the PC side, it bloated to over 10MB. WTF!?

Did you ever figure this out?

 

[sherrme]

Four years later...

...and the problem still exists. I have a file here that is 372KB, and when my client adds text and saves the file, the size balloons to over 40MB.

Allow fast saves is unchecked. I've tried adding text and saving in an earlier version of MS Word, and it still leaves me with a giant file size. The image resolution is 150 dpi.

I'm running OS X 10.3 and Word 2004, and the client is on XP with Word 2003.

Has anyone figured this out yet?

 

[scan300]

Has anyone figured this out yet?

I don't have a definitive solution but here is what I know...
There is no hard and fast rule as to why images uncompress in the Windows version of Word, even if you create the files on Windows. But the extent to the file size blowout will be close to the image size that you get when you have it open in Photoshop, not after you've saved it.

I have 2 methods (the second, you'll need access to Windows):

I've had some successes in Photoshop by saving graphics (save for web) as PNG-8 files. (this will give you an 8 bit image rather than 24 and is therefore less prone to blowout when uncompressed.) For some weird reason it seems to stay compressed in layouts that have simple header & footer designs. eg header graphics small and at the top. Footers small and at the bottom. (This seems to break when headers & footers creep down the sides of a design.) Try to avoid antialiasing when creating your rasterizing your files in Photoshop. Word seems to antialias graphics on screen, so you will get sharper graphics by leaving it off.

The fail-safe way to keep a design template small in file size is to use WMF (Windows Meta File) or EMF (Enhanced Meta File) graphics. But you can only do this on the Windows side; WMF/EMFs look crap on the Mac.
You can create WMF/EMF files on Illustrator on Windows & place them in Word on Windows (don't create them on Mac). So you need access to Word & Illustrator on a Windows machine. When you create a template that's 16 – 30K it stays that size.

 

[sherrme]

THANK YOU so much!

I tried your tip to save the graphics files as PNG-8, and that worked. The file size is still pretty large when my client re-saves it (5MB), but it's still able to be emailed.

Unfortunately, I don't have access to a Windows machine with Illustrator installed, so I wasn't able to save the graphics as WMF/EMF.

 

[Grant Gamble]

Another year passes...

I was wondering if Scan's infinite knowledge could help me with a very similar problem. I have been researching this for a long time now, but luckily stumbled upon your thread.
My problem also lies between mac and windows word, with graphics too. However, my graphics are editable graphs, special pasted from excel.
It is vital that they remain editable for the client. My problem is that I doubt I can convert my graphs to the required file type, whilst withholding it's ability to be edited.
Any suggestions?
Much appreciated

 

[scan300]

My problem also lies between mac and windows word, with graphics too. However, my graphics are editable graphs, special pasted from excel.
It is vital that they remain editable for the client. My problem is that I doubt I can convert my graphs to the required file type, whilst withholding it's ability to be edited.
Any suggestions?

I'm not sure what problem you have. If you paste an excel graph into Word, it does remain editable. Is there something else you wish to do with the graph?

 

[Grant Gamble]

Right, I created a word file on my macbook pro (Aluminum unibody) through parallels, windows word. The file contains charts special pasted from excel; which means that these graphs can be edited in word.
My problem is that when I move it to my imac (email/ usb flash drive etc) and open the file in Mac Word; if I edit the file the file size balloons. I have templates of these files with different numbers of the same charts in each and one with 12 graphs on my Macbook pro, is a much smaller file size than the same file, but with only four charts edited on the imac.
All of the charts can be edited on any windows based word program, with no file size increase at all. The problem lies somewhere between windows word and mac word.

So my problem is very similar to the others posted here; where the file size balloons to a ridiculously larger amount, but I doubt that I can resolve it using the same methods, because my graphic needs to remain editable.

File sizes tend to follow these patterns, increasing in bigger jumps:

To test, I emailed a 6 graph file to my imac again. Once I had edited 4 of the graphs; the file size had changed from 216kb to 1.8mb.
4 Graphs edited- 1.8mb 5 Graphs edited- 2.2mb 6 Graphs edited- 2.7mb.
Each time I edited the graphs, I use the same values. The file size should either not change at all, because values are being changed not added, or change by the same amount each time, but nowhere near the large amount it does.

Hope that's enough info, thanks alot.