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Cannot open a rescued Word document.doc

Microsoft Word errored out and I was forced to save a document as rescued document.doc.  However, when I try to open the doc, I get the message: 

"Microsoft Word cannot open this file because it is an unsupported file type."

How can I recover the contents?
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I know this thread is old but I have been trying the get past the "Microsoft Word cannot open this file because it is an unsupported file type" error when opening standalone .asd files all day today as my home backup task makes copies of the asd files that Word creates every 5 minutes and pastes the copy .asd into a separate folder to assist recovery from accidental deletions.  Call me paranoid :-)

The discovery I thought worth sharing is that I was able to successfully open .asd files with all the original formatting and text and the file looked exactly like the last time it was saved.  Previous to this discovery I kept getting the "......unsupported file type" error and the best i could do was recover the text using the text recovery or notepad options.  The same .asd files that couldn't open before now open correctly in "Read Only" mode but have all the text and formatting saving you minutes or hours of formatting work!

So here it is: (it's so simply but it works)

The first step is the most important - this is what made it work!

(1) Place a copy the .asd file into the unsaved files folder.  The location of this folder on my system is "C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Office\UnsavedFiles" 

(2) Open Word and click on File - Recent

(3) Looking down the bottom of the screen you see a button/box titled "Recover Unsaved Documents"

(4) Click that button/box and open the .asd file you placed in the unsaved files folder in Step (1).

If it works then a smile returns to your face and all is forgiven.  Blood pressure subsides and everyone is happy again.  If it doesn't work then the .asd is possibly corrupt and try recovering just the text out of the file using all the suggestions on this thread and the internet.  Good luck!

Last comment: Without doing the first step of placing the .asd file into the special folder I couldn't get past the error.  I'm not an advanced Word problem solver just a person trying to make my back routine work.  My environment is Windows 7 64-bit /  Word 2010 32-bit.

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Thanks Varun.  None of those suggestions worked, but it gave me an idea.

I opened WordPad.  

On File Open, I selected *.*, the *.doc and the document opened.  

I was able to then recover the text.  

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Last updated May 5, 2024 Views 89,006 Applies to: