ms word encoding

Try a repair of Word - Help > Detect and Repair. Alternatively via Add/Remove Programs > Word/Office > Change/Remove > Select Repair in the options dialogue box.

BTW - does just one Word document behave this way or all docs? What happens when you create a new document? Can you read it as you type and, having saved it, closed Word and then opened it again in Word is it readable?

if the problem persists search your drive for normal.dot and delete it. Word will recreate it the next time it is started.

 

That would suggest that the document is not a Word .doc, although possibly an early Word document. Any clue as to the format that 'convert from' refers to?

You should find normal.dot here ....

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates\Normal.dot

Administrator is the only account on this laptop so you may need to look under other accounts under C:\Documents and Settings\ ...

I rather doubt that deleting normal.dot will solve your problem if we are talking of a single document.