Graphical glitch in Word and Outlook (Office 365)

[ChevyAmpera]

@ChevyAmpera Ok great, your config is indeed identical which is great for further troubleshooting. Which CPU & mainboard are you using? I'm using Intel 13900K / Intel 12900K and Asus ROG MAXIMUS Z690 Hero @bios 2204

@FSx3 I'm using Intel i9-13900K as well and a Gigabyte Z790 AORUS ELITE AX mainboard.

 

[VDB]

I need to vent. Please humor me...

The situation is essentially this: For any Windows user with an NVIDIA card, Microsoft Office is unusable. And almost no one notices? How is that possible?

In fact, this is the only forum thread I can find that is directly addressing this issue. How can that be?

Dear Microsoft and/or NVIDIA: Please notice this bug! Please stop replying to forums with lame responses like: Repair or reinstall Office, sfc /scannow, DISM, or other nonsense that is obviously worthless in this case. Please notice this severe problem and reply with something like: We already know about this and will issue a fix. Please!

How can it be that, for many millions of users, Microsoft Office has been unusable for many months, and neither Microsoft nor NVIDIA know about it? How in heaven's name? Astounding beyond words!

Befuddled,
VDB

 

[Shou Miko]

@VDB the biggest change that I have issues with mostly on laptops with switchable graphics are someone at Microsoft decided to remove the disable graphics acceleration option inside Word, Excel and etc.

I spoke with a couple of people in Microsoft's 365 support about this and I got told they have noted this but the more that complain that this feature has been removed the more the support team and forward this to the developers and have a possible positive turn out that this setting will return since Windows is unable to handle these request for their own software.

 

[ChevyAmpera]

I need to vent. Please humor me...

The situation is essentially this: For any Windows user with an NVIDIA card, Microsoft Office is unusable. And almost no one notices? How is that possible?

In fact, this is the only forum thread I can find that is directly addressing this issue. How can that be?

Dear Microsoft and/or NVIDIA: Please notice this bug! Please stop replying to forums with lame responses like: Repair or reinstall Office, sfc /scannow, DISM, or other nonsense that is obviously worthless in this case. Please notice this severe problem and reply with something like: We already know about this and will issue a fix. Please!

How can it be that, for many millions of users, Microsoft Office has been unusable for many months, and neither Microsoft nor NVIDIA know about it? How in heaven's name? Astounding beyond words!

Befuddled,
VDB

@VDB There are a couple of other users reporting the issue, but i think the overlap between the group of users that have a Nvidia 30xx or 40xx graphics card installed and that use MS Office frequently enough to notice or be bothered by this bug is fairly small :

https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforc...80-office-365-onenote-text-glitches-w11-22h2/

https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/5c3e818d-408d-ed11-a81b-000d3ae32cd0

https://www.reddit.com/r/MicrosoftWord/comments/yd0amh
Both Microsoft and Nvidia are aware of this bug as well, but have been mainly trying to push the responsibility to fix this bug on eachother instead of actually trying to fix it.

I also don't think that users that use MS Office frequently enough to be bothered by this bug are the users that Microsoft or Nvidia care about and would prioritize when it comes to fixing bugs.

Personally I've also noticed that it has become pretty common for system breaking bugs to not be adressed in a timely manner in general (or maybe I've just been incredibly unlucky in this regard). I'm not just taking about Microsoft or Nvidia either, but any kind of system breaking bug I've encountered in the last couple of months.

 

[FSx3]

but i think the overlap between the group of users that have a Nvidia 30xx or 40xx graphics card installed and that use MS Office ... is fairly small :

Exactly that! I was wondering as well why so few reports about this issue came up. This config most likely isn't a typical work config - work configs are usually iGPU powered I believe. My 4090 GPU is used 8 hours a day for work and maybe 1-2 hrs for gaming.

push the responsibility to fix this bug on eachother instead of actually trying to fix it.

Indeed! In this case the fact that AMD users are also affected (maybe less often?) puts the issue into Microsofts responsibility. At the same time the issue isn't reproducible when there is load on the GPU and / or the (Nvidia) GPU driver is deactivated.

positive turn out that this setting will return since Windows is unable to handle these request for their own software.

Visiblity is key to get any solution. That's why I'm very thankful for anyone affected contributing to these forum threads.

@FSx3 I'm using Intel i9-13900K as well and a Gigabyte Z790 AORUS ELITE AX mainboard.

Thanks! Really interesting information as I wasn't sure if my Z690 board Raptorlake UEFI could have been part of the problem.

 

[ThirtyNinety]

@VDB There are a couple of other users reporting the issue, but i think the overlap between the group of users that have a Nvidia 30xx or 40xx graphics card installed and that use MS Office frequently enough to notice or be bothered by this bug is fairly small :

https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforc...80-office-365-onenote-text-glitches-w11-22h2/

https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/5c3e818d-408d-ed11-a81b-000d3ae32cd0

https://www.reddit.com/r/MicrosoftWord/comments/yd0amh
Both Microsoft and Nvidia are aware of this bug as well, but have been mainly trying to push the responsibility to fix this bug on eachother instead of actually trying to fix it.

I also don't think that users that use MS Office frequently enough to be bothered by this bug are the users that Microsoft or Nvidia care about and would prioritize when it comes to fixing bugs.

Personally I've also noticed that it has become pretty common for system breaking bugs to not be adressed in a timely manner in general (or maybe I've just been incredibly unlucky in this regard). I'm not just taking about Microsoft or Nvidia either, but any kind of system breaking bug I've encountered in the last couple of months.

I checked and this setting can now be found in Windows 11 under Settings --> Accessibility --> Visual Effects --> Animation Effects.

It was disabled here, but the suggestion on the Reddit topic tells to do otherwise as it states uncheck the "Turn Off Animation Effects" box, which means one should enable these effects. As everything works fine here in Office without these effects, it is certainly not the fix.

 

[ChevyAmpera]

I checked and this setting can now be found in Windows 11 under Settings --> Accessibility --> Visual Effects --> Animation Effects.

It was disabled here, but the suggestion on the Reddit topic tells to do otherwise as it states uncheck the "Turn Off Animation Effects" box, which means one should enable these effects. As everything works fine here in Office without these effects, it is certainly not the fix.

Yeah this suggested fix didn't work for me either.

 

[neatfeatguy]

The only other option for people, if this issue continues, (and I know this won't be a solution for everyone) is to get a key to a version of office 2016 (maybe 2019 will work? I don't know, I don't have 2019 so I cannot verify this version will be a solution). I still use 2016 at home (my work computer is on 2010 for everything except Outlook) and I have no issues with any graphical glitches on either machine when using the office programs. My office computer uses a fancy 730 GT and my home computer is on a 3080 (both Windows 10).

This is just a suggestion that'll resolve the issue for folks, but I know not everyone will be able to or even willing to do it.

 

[Betablocker]

I need to vent. Please humor me...

The situation is essentially this: For any Windows user with an NVIDIA card, Microsoft Office is unusable. And almost no one notices? How is that possible?

In fact, this is the only forum thread I can find that is directly addressing this issue. How can that be?

Dear Microsoft and/or NVIDIA: Please notice this bug! Please stop replying to forums with lame responses like: Repair or reinstall Office, sfc /scannow, DISM, or other nonsense that is obviously worthless in this case. Please notice this severe problem and reply with something like: We already know about this and will issue a fix. Please!

How can it be that, for many millions of users, Microsoft Office has been unusable for many months, and neither Microsoft nor NVIDIA know about it? How in heaven's name? Astounding beyond words!

Befuddled,
VDB

I can tell you how this can be: There are millions of users who have a GPU by NVIDIA and who are using MS Office without the slightest issues. I for example don't have problems anymore since a clean installation of Windows 11. I have a GTX 1080.

...and by the way: Not only NVIDIA-cards are affected, but also AMD-GPUs. That's why I think that the issue is not hardware-, but software-related.

 

[ChevyAmpera]

The only other option for people, if this issue continues, (and I know this won't be a solution for everyone) is to get a key to a version of office 2016 (maybe 2019 will work? I don't know, I don't have 2019 so I cannot verify this version will be a solution). I still use 2016 at home (my work computer is on 2010 for everything except Outlook) and I have no issues with any graphical glitches on either machine when using the office programs. My office computer uses a fancy 730 GT and my home computer is on a 3080 (both Windows 10).

This is just a suggestion that'll resolve the issue for folks, but I know not everyone will be able to or even willing to do it.

Office 2019 has the same issue. I actually bought Office 2021 hoping that doing a clean install of Windows 11 and installing the new version of Office would fix the issue, but it didn't work.
For people that either don't have a key to Office 2016 or earlier versions ,don't want to buy one, and would be willing to switch to an alteraitive to MS Office LibreOffice might be a suitable alternative as it doesn't diplay any glitches either. I haven't tried OpenOffice,but I assume it would work as well.

It's still not acceptable that a paid software like MS Office is rendered unusable for some users for months, while free alternatives work without an issue.

 

[FSx3]

• Windows 11 (Build 22621.1105) & Office 365 (Build 16.0.15928.20196) updates from yesterday didn't improve the issue (as expected, security patches)
• More AMD users are speaking up in my Reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Office365/comments/zfg62e
• Microsoft Feedback Bug Report is slowly getting more user reports but still far away from appearing "urgent" to Microsoft: https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/5c3e818d-408d-ed11-a81b-000d3ae32cd0

 

[VDB]

Update: Microsoft Office remains unusable! (Latest versions of everything.) Many months have now gone by. Unimaginable... yet true!

 

[FSx3]

I totally second that! Was working the whole day in Excel, Outlook and OneNote and it constantly gliteches around. Incredibly distracting. I should invoice Microsoft for the negative performance impact... I also accept stock compensation...

 

[lemonadesoda]

Word 2003 working solid for me. Glad I didnt upgrade

 

[Mussels]

This has got to be an issue with office itself, with all the different hardware and software things we've seen so far


I dont use these versions of office, just 2017 and google docs - are people updating them via windows updates, the optional settings?

(Mine are for a razer keyboard so irrelevant to this)

 

[Frick]

The only other option for people, if this issue continues, (and I know this won't be a solution for everyone) is to get a key to a version of office 2016 (maybe 2019 will work? I don't know, I don't have 2019 so I cannot verify this version will be a solution). I still use 2016 at home (my work computer is on 2010 for everything except Outlook) and I have no issues with any graphical glitches on either machine when using the office programs. My office computer uses a fancy 730 GT and my home computer is on a 3080 (both Windows 10).

This is just a suggestion that'll resolve the issue for folks, but I know not everyone will be able to or even willing to do it.

Office 2021 with a RTX 3060ti on Windows 10 does not have the issue, so I think it's a Windows 11 thing.

 

[FSx3]

Office 2021 with a RTX 3060ti on Windows 10 does not have the issue, so I think it's a Windows 11 thing.

Yes I agree! In my Reddit thread (Link) we've collected quite a few affected configurations and none of them are Windows 10 / all of them are Windows 11.

Updates:

• Newest Nvidia GDR driver 528.24 release today doesn't help.
• Some home on the upcoming Office 365 beta channel (Link): "We fixed an issue where some users were getting high CPU and heavy flicker while scrolling around in the calendar." Maybe the team then also looks into our bug...

 

[Shou Miko]

Yes I agree! In my Reddit thread (Link) we've collected quite a few affected configurations and none of them are Windows 10 / all of them are Windows 11.

Updates:

• Newest Nvidia GDR driver 528.24 release today doesn't help.
• Some home on the upcoming Office 365 beta channel (Link): "We fixed an issue where some users were getting high CPU and heavy flicker while scrolling around in the calendar." Maybe the team then also looks into our bug...

This all sounds like that Microsoft's Office ain't heavy enough to require gpu acceleration if we are at a point in time where the gpu's go almost below idle to run it, then it should just do cpu load only problem solved.

 

[Frick]

Yes I agree! In my Reddit thread (Link) we've collected quite a few affected configurations and none of them are Windows 10 / all of them are Windows 11.

Updates:

• Newest Nvidia GDR driver 528.24 release today doesn't help.
• Some home on the upcoming Office 365 beta channel (Link): "We fixed an issue where some users were getting high CPU and heavy flicker while scrolling around in the calendar." Maybe the team then also looks into our bug...

Are the Windows installs clean, ie no other programs/apps? The other day Word and Excel wouldn't work properly (no glitches, but crashes and failure to load previews in Explorer) and it was Powertoys Awake that caused those problems.

 

[FSx3]

Are the Windows installs clean, ie no other programs/apps? The other day Word and Excel wouldn't work properly (no glitches, but crashes and failure to load previews in Explorer) and it was Powertoys Awake that caused those problems.

Yes, 100% clean aka:

• SSD with no partitions, installed via USB installation media
• Nothing installed except W11 fully updated & Office 365 fully updated
• No W11 or Office 365 settings changed = all Default
• Nvidia Driver installed via W11 update

I did two of these installs on 2 different machines. 100% reproducible on these machines.

 

[VDB]

Another update: As the months roll by, Microsoft Office remains TOTALLY UNUSABLE for the basic task of entering and editing text! Unbelievable, but true! All the latest versions of Windows 11, Office, Graphics Drivers, etc. do not alleviate the problem. Nothing can be done to make Office usable; the issue persists regardless of settings or other installed software. How is it possible that this disastrous problem is still not addressed after so much time? How much longer before there exists a fix?

 

[FSx3]

How is it possible that this disastrous problem is still not addressed after so much time? How much longer before there exists a fix?

I fear that:

• most Office 365 users run integrated graphics and so they don't experience this problem
• most users are still on Windows 10 or earlier
• most affected users are not actively speaking up
• resulting in almost no visibility at the Office 365 engineering team
• and us having to wait for many more weeks for a solution if any

In our MS feedback thread only 7 users reported in. Also MS doesn't seem to monitor forums. Additionally with such small amount of affected users there's no news site coverage.

In comparison the other issue (I'm affected as well) regarding Samsung 990 Pro NVMe SSD health degradation took the tech news internet by storm.

 

[IgnatioMemo]

I also opened a thread in the Word forum over at MS feedback (https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/3ae089c6-da95-ed11-a81b-000d3ae32cd0) - maybe Word issues get more visibility than OneNote, as Word presumably has a much larger user base.

 

[Mussels]

Are the Windows installs clean, ie no other programs/apps? The other day Word and Excel wouldn't work properly (no glitches, but crashes and failure to load previews in Explorer) and it was Powertoys Awake that caused those problems.

reminds me of spending a week finding out why i couldnt get my monitor to sleep, and it was because a device had a yellow triangle in device manager (a virtual display for my VR)
This does seem like a problem with office specifically at this rate


The longer reddit post above mentioned low 2D clocks as being related - I can't recall if people have tried disabling HAGS, ReBAR on and off, manually clocking VRAM higher (reminds me of how monitors would have the GPU forced to clock up the VRAM at high refresh rates, except now it's office that needs it)

If theres a trial version of 365 i might give it a shot here and try to reproduce
Ah. No.

 

[FSx3]

I also opened a thread in the Word forum over at MS feedback (https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/3ae089c6-da95-ed11-a81b-000d3ae32cd0) - maybe Word issues get more visibility than OneNote, as Word presumably has a much larger user base.

Awesome! Indeed Word will definitely get more visibility, will add my feedback there as well.

The longer reddit post above mentioned low 2D clocks as being related - I can't recall if people have tried disabling HAGS, ReBAR on and off, manually clocking VRAM higher (reminds me of how monitors would have the GPU forced to clock up the VRAM at high refresh rates, except now it's office that needs it)

Yes I tried HAGS = off, Resizable Bar = off but didn't try VRAM higher as any significant load on the GPU instantly makes the issue disappear. That's why I thought it's Nvidia's fault but now that AMD users are affected as well it's more likely on Microsofts desk.

If theres a trial version of 365 i might give it a shot here and try to reproduce
Ah. No.

You can install OneNote from "Microsoft Store" for free. It's the same code base as the Office 365 applications and so the issue can be reproduced as well.