How to Repair & Restore an Unreadable Microsoft PowerPoint Presentation
JULIETTE HALLIWELL
TECH
Dealing with an unreadable PowerPoint presentation is a worrisome issue that can arise if you frequently share files using email or flash drives. Thankfully, you may be able to restore your corrupt file -- or part of it -- by importing your slides from the unreadable presentation into a new, blank presentation. By testing if the damaged file produces different results on other computers and earlier versions of PowerPoint, you can determine if issue is isolated within the file or if you need to make repairs to your software.
1 Open the presentation in an earlier version of PowerPoint
Open the presentation in an earlier version of PowerPoint. Office.com recommends using PowerPoint 2000 because early versions of PowerPoint may be unable to detect corruption on later versions of PowerPoint files. If the presentation opens successfully, you can transfer the files in the unreadable presentation to a new presentation in PowerPoint 2010.
2 Select New Slide
Select "New Slide" under the Home tab and the Slides group in PowerPoint 2010. Click "Reuse Slides."
3 Click Open a PowerPoint File
Click "Open a PowerPoint File" and then select the unreadable presentation. Your slides will be imported into the blank presentation.
4 Make any adjustments
Make any adjustments necessary to your slides and then save the new presentation.
- You may want to try opening the unreadable presentation on another computer before you attempt to restore it on your on computer. If the file opens without issue on the different computer, your PowerPoint software may need updates or repairs (see Resources).
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