This tip was submitted by user Fred Brack, who was having a problem with POP or BOING when he started Word. It turned out to be an add-in, but it wasn't easy to figure out which one. The add-in was modifying normal.dot when it loaded, and did some messing around with the clipboard, either clearing it or updating it. Lots of times add-ins will use the clipboard to copy/paste a toolbar button, but this one did something else - it's unclear as to what it's doing with the clipboard. But here's Fred's excellent report on how he tracked it down:
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1. The key to solving this problem was my recollection, as I may or may not have mentioned to you, that I recently noticed that every time I closed Word, it was saving normal.dot, even if I didn't make any modifications to the file being edited. Annoying, curious, but not serious enough of a problem to investigate previously. But I decided to investigate this problem last night.
2. I Googled "normal.dot." Tons of entries. A corrupted normal.dot can cause all sorts of problems, so I followed some standard techniques for debugging as if that was my problem.
3. The first recommended step is to start word from the command line with the /a" switch. This disables the loading of all add-ins. No boing, no saving of normal.dot. That pretty much confirmed the problem was with an add-in of sorts. (Of all the steps here, this is the key one for you to remember, as it may help point the user to confirmation of an add-in problem!)
4. I tried lots of other general steps recommended for more serious problems to no avail.
5. Then I read the key: if an add-in modifies Word DURING EACH STARTUP to add a menu item, Word thinks the user made a mod to normal.dot, so it saves it.
6. So I started looking through the menus for something that didn't look "regular." Bingo: File, Send To, Bluetooth. I had added a DLink USB Bluetooth adapter a couple of months ago. I searched Add/Remove Programs for any DLink entries. None. But I did find a name I recognized as something which showed up on a menu associated with Bluetooth: WIDComm.
7. I removed it. Problem solved!
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Here's the reference I found which triggered the solution: http://www.kbalertz.com/kb_873017.aspx.
And here is an excellent source of info about normal.dot problems:
http://pubs.logicalexpressions.com/Pub0009/LPMArticle.asp?ID=151
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Another user reported that his extra "pop" when opening word was due to an add-in called Repligo. When he removed Repligo, the problem went away.
Another user reports that his problem was caused by pdf maker toolbar from Adobe acrobat.