Blank Excel 2019 spreadsheet; not enough memory to copy all

Question

The issue: I opened a new blank workbook with only one clean spreadsheet. Ctrl + A to select all, then Ctrl + C to copy. The "there isn't enough memory" error showed up as in the picture below.

1) I actually used the 64-bit Excel, as shown in another picture.

2) This doesn't seem like an actual memory issue, because I followed the exact procedure on my partner's laptop (which is the same Surface Pro 7, same everything, as mine), while her machine actually had less memory (~1.5GB) left at the moment than mine (~2.5GB). Her Excel copied the (all empty) cells just fine.

3) This doesn't seem like an anti-virus program issue because I removed my Avira, removed then reinstalled a clean Office, the problem was still there without an anti-virus program running.

4) Also, I had no strange add-ins. There's only the Dropbox add-in, which my partner had too and her Excel worked just fine.

5) I tried the "office scrub" to clean all potentially partially hidden versions of Office then reinstalled Office 2019. It didn't work.

6) I feel like somehow my Excel actually wanted to demand the memory space to swallow the whole spreadsheet and then failed, without knowing there wasn't any data - I saved the blank file as a CSV and checked it up using the textbook; really nothing there in the file. Potentially related to this, when I selected and copied a whole column, my Excel froze a bit then came back, seemingly trying to actually store the many (empty) cells. This again doesn't happen on my partner's machine.

Answer 1

Hi @Yen-Ping Chang ,

Please run Excel in safe mode to have a check.
You could press Ctrl and hold on, double-click Excel icon, when Excel asks you if you want to start in safe mode, please release the Ctrl key and say Yes to start Excel in safe mode.
Then you could check this issue again.
Safe mode could help us troubleshoot the add-ins and start items.

Besides, please go to Start menu > Settings > Clipboard > Turn off Clipboard history.

Any updates, you could post back.

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Answer 2

Oh thanks a lot!!!

The safe doesn't do anything. BUT, disabling the clipboard saves the day :) Thank you