Excel 2007 performance greatly decreases if an Excel 2007 workbook has many shapes

If a Microsoft Office Excel 2007 workbook has many shapes, the performance of Excel 2007 greatly decreases. This problem may be more noticeable if you use a macro that uses the workbook.

Important This section, method, or task contains steps that tell you how to modify the registry. However, serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Therefore, make sure that you follow these steps carefully. For added protection, back up the registry before you modify it. Then, you can restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up and restore the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: To resolve this problem, apply hotfix package 959640, and then enable the hotfix package. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Apply hotfix package 959640. For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
   959640� Description of the Excel 2007 hotfix package (Excel.msp, Xlconv.msp, Oartconv.msp, Oart.msp): December 16, 2008
2. Enable the hotfix package. To do this, follow these steps:
   1. In Windows Vista, click Start
      , type regedit in the Start Search box, and then press ENTER.
      
      
      If you are prompted for an administrator password or for confirmation, type the password, or click Continue.
      
      In Windows XP, click Start, click Run, type regedit , and then click OK.
   2. Locate and then click the following registry subkey: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Excel\Options\
   3. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.
   4. Type EnableFastTxLink, and then press ENTER.
   5. Right-click EnableFastTxLink, and then click Modify.
   6. In the Value data box, type 1, and then click OK.
   7. Exit Registry Editor.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section.