"Cannot empty the clipboard!" message error doing my head in...

[medexcel]

I recently got a new PC running Windows 7, 64 bit edition. Installed Office 2003 Pro without any problems. But every time I drag a cell somewhere on the worksheet, I get an annoying error message"Cannot empty the clipboard!" that has to be clicked to proceed with the drag. It only happens when dragging, not when copy/pasting.

This has never happened before on any machine running Office 2003 that I've experienced, and is really annoying as it slows me down a lot. All the fixes I've found from Googling talk about killing the process rdpclip.exe (not running on my machine), not using GetRight Monitor version 3.2 (I'm not), clearing the Monitor Clipboard (empty), clearing the clipboard (no effect) or using a hotfix that's only for users of Microsoft Windows Server 2003-based server (I'm not using that, I'm on Win 7).

Please help, it's driving me mad! What on earth is happening?

 

[medexcel]

How in the WORLD did anyone think to check whether the Skype extension in Firefox was the cause of this? Anyway, I just disabled the extension (frankly, I didn't even realise it was installed...) and let's see if the problem goes away. It's just so random - I've tried closing all sorts of things until now, and on all the computers I've ever had, none have had this issue before.

 

[Robert.S]

Just because there are so many unresolved threads for this issue all over Google, I wanted to post here and say that removing the (horrible) skype addon from IE8 fixed my issue.

Even though I use Firefox all the time, IE8 is open for testing non-logged in users or different logins for various sites ... who would have thought Skype would interfere with Excel when copy-dragging one basic cell.

So far it looks fixed in about 30 secs work.

Thanks a lot for posting this here!

Robert

Edit: Dell Studio 15". Windows 7 64-bit, Office 2010, latest version of FireFox 4 & IE8

 

[medexcel]

Ditto. I don't want to speak too soon, since I've tried a few things like not having Word and Excel, or Outlook and Excel, running simultaneously and it's appeared to help only for the problem to go away. But I must say the past week since disabling the Skype thingy I haven't had any issues so far. Total mystery why Skype (if it is that) should affect Excel's ability to cut and paste, and I hadn't even realised until then that the reason phone numbers in Firefox are automatically highlighted is down to Skype. Maybe none of my other computers have this "feature" - and I don't use it anyway, to me it's harder to read the phone numbers if SKype has highlighed them and if I need to call a number IO pick up the phone.

Here's hoping the problem is finally sorted and a massive thanks to those who pointed out the Skype bug. Next question - is anyone at Skype listening to this?

 

[AlisaA]

One week in, and I have not seen another error message! I am so grateful I could seriously smooch the person from whom I got the fix, or at the least build a shrine to him/her/it. ray:

I don't know if you noticed, but Skype would try to turn any set of numbers into a phone number - account #s, confirmation #s, etc. Must be part of what was chewing up so much memory.

Anyway, I'm so glad this is helping others!!! Hooray!!

 

[RhodeRider]

Amazing. Goodbye error!

 

[schuse]

It was great to find a recent forum to discuss this. Testing this was simple since I am an active Skype user. IE was open and Click to Call was enabled. Once I disabled it and retarted IE, no error warning with Excel drag/drop.

I closed IE and opened FireFox. Received the error warning again in Excel. Click to Call add-on was then disabled. Restarted FF and NO warning in Excel.

Thank you for a quality thread. There are about 30 other forums out there that need this answer.

 

[medexcel]

There are plenty of forums discussing this, but when is the key forum going to take any notice - ie when are Skype themselves going to overcome the bug? I keep getting reminders from Skype to update their software and don't want to as long as it's got such a critical bug in it.

 

[planetjakob]

You mutha-fudger!! I registered on this site just to tell you I love you!

Skype

 

[mpos1948]

Please advise how I delete the Skype add-in in IE

 

[AlisaA]

Go to Tools / Manage Add-ons and search for the Skype extension, then select Disable. You should be good to go, then - bye-bye annoying error message!!