PowerPoint Presentations Do Not Open After Upgrading to Windows 10

If you are trying to open a PowerPoint presentation or any other Microsoft Office document after upgrading from Windows 7 to Windows 10, you will find that these documents may not open. This article guides you on how to fix the issue opening Microsoft Office documents after upgrading your system to Windows 10.

One of the following errors can be received while trying to open Office documents:

• This Excel file is corrupt and cannot be opened
• The application was unable to start correctly, PowerPoint found a problem with the file or PowerPoint can’t this read.
• Word experienced an error trying to open the file

The reason why these files won’t open is because Microsoft Office is trying to open an Outlook attachment using Protected Mode and it fails. Protected mode helps to keep your computer safe and protected, and disabling it in Windows is not recommended.

Microsoft suggest to keep all your files up-to-date so the first thing to do is to run an upgrade check and make sure the Microsoft Office is updated to its latest version. If the upgrade fixes the issue then that’s great, otherwise please following the instructions below.

Open the Terminal and then run the following command:

icacls "%programfiles%\Microsoft Office 15" /grant *S-1-15-2-1:(OI)(CI)RX

Make sure to use your Office version. Replace Office 15 by any other version if this number differs. Notice this is the codename so if you are using PowerPoint 2013 this value will be Office 15, while if you are using Microsoft PowerPoint 2010, it will be Office 14.