Turned on my laptop this morning to find that all my MS Office apps have changed! And it doesn't look pretty! I have checked colour depth, aero, high contrast, reverted to Windows 7 personalisation styles - is there anything else I should be doing? I can't bear to work with these icons I feel like I have been thrown back to 1991! Any solutions hugely appreciated! Thanks ... James

• Edited by James Jameson Thursday, May 02, 2013 10:31 AM
• Moved by beedeagleMicrosoft contingent staff Friday, May 03, 2013 7:26 AM

Hi James,

I'm not sure what icons you are refering to, could you upload a screenshot?

Have you make any change before this happened?

If you have enabled System Restore, try to restore your computer to an earlier time.

If your laptop is located at an enterprise environment, try confirm if this change is made by your system administrator.

Also check if you have any special add-ins enabled, disable them to determine if the add-ins could be the cause.

Hi thanks for your reply. For some reason I cannot upload a screenshot the easy way! Apparently I need to verify my account and although I have contacted the forum admins this doesn't seem to have got me anywhere.

Let's try this anyway! 

tinypic (dot) com/r/14tbvwl/5

• Edited by James Jameson Tuesday, May 07, 2013 1:42 PM
• Edited by Max MengMicrosoft contingent staff, Moderator Wednesday, May 08, 2013 5:59 AM upload image for op

Hi James,

I got your screenshot, and as I suggested, if your laptop is located at an enterprise environment, please try confirm if this change is made by your system administrator.

Thanks Max. My laptop is located at an enterprise environment but I am the Sys Admin of it, we basically all 'look after' our own devices. I didn't make any changes intentionally - maybe my young daughter hammered some keys. Either way I'm completely stuck with this weird looking GUI for all my MS Office apps. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated! 

Hi James,

I have suggested you to check if you have any add-ins enabled, have you checked? What's the result?

Also try to start the applications in safe mode with the /safe switch, for example, Outlook.exe /safe

If no add-ins has been found, and this behavior also occurs in safe mode, try repair your Office as a quick fix.

If this behaivor won't occurs in safe mode, check if there are any files named with the *.officeUI file extension under the following folders:

%userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Office\

%userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Office\

and move them out of the folder, then restart any Office application to check if this behavior still persists.

Add ins enabled (Go To Meeting) - disabled and no change. 

Safe mode - no change. 

Moved *.officeUI files from %userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Office\ and no change. 

Errr?!!?! Help! 

• Proposed as answer by Shawn Barrington Thursday, June 20, 2013 5:26 PM
• Unproposed as answer by Shawn Barrington Thursday, June 20, 2013 5:26 PM

I don't know if you have found an answer for this problem yet or not.  But I recently had this exact problem.  This is how I fixed it.  Search your computer for a program called "Air Display" if it is open exit out of it.  Or if you don't use it I would say remove it from your programs.  

This seemed to fix my issues let me know if it does the same for you.

 

Thanks Sean _ I have since done a complete format and re-install which fixed it! But thanks for the reply anyway!

Shawn! You are a champion. I have literally been plugging away at this issue for hours! You have saved my laptop from getting thrown out the window! Additionally for other users, this issue occurred when updating a version of DisplayLink (I use three monitors). For some reason this coupled with 'Air Display' caused this complication. I simply removed Air Display from my programs and it corrected the problem immediately.

I don't know if you have found an answer for this problem yet or not.  But I recently had this exact problem.  This is how I fixed it.  Search your computer for a program called "Air Display" if it is open exit out of it.  Or if you don't use it I would say remove it from your programs.  

This seemed to fix my issues let me know if it does the same for you.

 

I honestly cannot thank you enough, I had the ribbon icon issue along with aero not working and by removing Air Display all is well.