Excel Comments Compatibility

Question

I have recently upgraded some of my computers from Excel 2007 to Excel 365 (build 1908).

If I open an existing 2007 *.xlsx file which contains comments in some cells, and save in the new version, it becomes unreadable in 2007.  There is an error opening the file, and after repairing this, all comments are gone.  Clearly there is a compatibility issue.

Excel 365 gives an option to "Save As" the format of earlier versions of Excel, for instance 97-2003, and that works (but with other functionalities removed).  However there appears to be no option to "Save As" in the intermediate format compatible with Excel versions between 2003 and 2016, such as Excel 2007.

Moreover even with new files created in Excel 2016 it appears to suffer when comments are added.  In case of scrolling up and down through large spreadsheets with no comments the responsiveness is instant.  However if some comments are inserted into cells, it becomes slow and unresponsive.  There is a delay of half a second or so at each scroll click on new fast machines, or nearly two seconds on older computers, which makes moving through larger spreadsheets very tedious and time consuming.  How can both of these issues be solved?  I suppose the latter might be related to a graphics setting, and for the former there must be some other way to save from Excel 365 in a format that is backwards-compatible with 2007 - as can be done for 97-2003.

Answer 1

Hi James,

Thanks for your query in this community. Really sorry about the inconvenience caused by this issue.

In the Excel 365, starting from version 1902 the comments function has been upgrade to apply for the workbook online co-authoring function. So there might be some changes on this function which cause this compatibility issue.

In this kind of scenario, the best method to report this behavior to the product team is clicking on the Smile face in your Excel application, you could check the following article for more information:

How do I give feedback on Microsoft Office?

Although the Office 2007 has end of the support life cycle, this compatibility issue is caused by the Office 365, thus I think it's necessary for you to submit the feedback. Thanks for your understanding.

Regards,

Alex Chen

Answer 2

To:  James

Re:  Comments

Your new Excel version has been "improved" - are you happy?

Comments from older versions are now called "Notes" and Comments now are connected messages (or something).

[edited]-Some explanation here:

https://support.office.com/en-us/article/the-difference-between-threaded-comments-and-notes-75a51eec-4092-42ab-abf8-7669077b7be3

I have nothing further to offer - I don't use Office 365 and don't plan on using it.